Documentary-collections Books

It would be a vast understatement to say that Sophia (Sonya) Tolstoy was a remarkable woman.

Not only did she bear 13 children, lead her financially inept husband back from the brink of ruin, copy and recopy Tolstoy's literary works, defend the interests of the large family in the face of Tolstoy's continual impassioned desires to renounce his worldly wealth... Sonya was also an astoundingly artistic and proficient photographer. Between 1887 and her death in 1919, Sonya Tolstoy took over 1000 photographs (using 13 x 18 cm glass plates), developing many herself, including portraits, vignettes of family life, the Yasnaya Polyana estate and surrounding countryside. This new volume unites some 180 of these pictures with fascinating biographic notes and extracts from Sonya's, Lev's and their children's diaries to present a rich and invaluable portrait of this woman's and this family's life.

A large preponderance of the photos are portraits of her husband, and in few of them does Lev offer more than a sage pose with furrowed brow and hand wedged behind his belt. But look closer and there are plenty of satisfying glimpses of spontaneity: a child's bored glare, a room in disarray, a subject caught chatting with a neighbor, a nurse caught in the corner of the frame. This is an important contribution to our understanding of the life and times of one of Russia's greatest writers. And of his remarkable, multifaceted wife. (Reviewed in Russian Life)

I am buying this book for all of my friends. I was only sorry that the book ended. Man or woman - it doesn't matter - this is a wonderful book that puts you in touch with their world and presents life's questions in a very contemporary way. It seems like she's sitting with you in conversation today. Very compelling. Now my task is to find more on her as well as read Tolstoy - slowly, very slowly and fully. What a wonderful road ahead.

Saw a preview for this book and was not disappointed when I received it. The photos are amazing - I am in awe that she was able to create such thoughtful, creative images with the limits of photography and where she was living!

The book combines her photos, her handwriting and wonderful writing by the author. The writing is mindful and clean - not esoteric and flowery but interesting and insightful!

Bought one for me and one for a friend! Not just for photographers but history buffs and artists of all kind!

This is A MUST for the following people: Who've read Tolstoy's two historical books; a photographer; those who love diaries and their insight to the person; Russaphiles; and last, but certainly not least, anyone who is interested in the development of a woman and the feminist inclinations. Truly an invaluable contribution to the 19th Century, for all these perspectives. She was an incredible woman!

Absolutely tremendous. It is my favorite book of color Colorado photographs.

Photographers are a dime a dozen. Kathleen Norris Cook with Western Relfections Publishing shows that there are a few good photographers. Get the book!

The Roman poet and orator Horace once wrote: "Ars longis; vitae brevis." "Art is long; life is short." There is never enough time in the San Juans to enjoy these mountains fully, yet in this volume one is able to savor it's spirit over and over. Kathleen Norris Cook is a great photographer.

How then does light return to our world in the San Juan Mountains after the setting of the sun? Miraculously. Boldly. In broad stripes. It hangs like a glass cage. It is a hoop that seemingly cannot be captured.

Next moment a flash of a camera. Then an image is recorded as if earth were breathing in and out, once, twice, as if for the first time. In this camera sharp place where the only electricity is in such thunderous lightning, there are no sounds in an afternoon save the hum of a rainbow. It is so spectacular, so luminous, so fresh, that we intruders feel also quiet, intense and strangely tiptoe, as if in anticipation.

The mountains throb purple and green, and gradually the valleys below drink in red, brown and gold. Suddenly a mountain stream snatches a blue light. The earth absorbs color like a sponge, slowly drinking the mountain sun. It puts on weight; rounds itself; hangs pendent; settles and sways beneath our feet through the lens of Kathleen Norris Cook. There's no telling what a collection of such beauty, power and insight might inspire.

This is the best photographic testament to the USA since Robert Frank came to shore and showed us how strange and beautiful our country was nearly fifty years ago. The subject of these photographs are both ordinary and extraordinary people, who we may cross paths with during any given day. The brilliance of Sternfeld's art is the way these images draw you into the world of each subject. Even the most superficially mundane subject such as two suburban kids standing in a cul-de-sac is cause for reflection. Most of these portraits economically use the scenery to define the world of each individual. In the end, the images are a celebration of anonymous Americans (one can't say "typical" because this collection shows you that there is no such thing as a typical American) in common settings. In my mind, the best images here evoke the mystery and power of a Vermeer painting. The way they heighten our experience of everyday images is what I think they call art.
A side note: If you have the chance, you must see the exhibit at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. The hyperreal poster-size prints are a wonder to behold. And the cumulative effect of these images leaves one exaltant. (Oh yeah, there's also a pretty good Ansel Adams exhibit curated by John Szarkowski on the floor above.)

"American Prospects," a landmark study of how the modern social order is revealed through landscape, published in 1988, brought brilliant photographer Joel Sternfeld to international attention. Sternfeld expanded this study with "A Stranger Passing." The sixty color portraits of ordinary Americans included in this book, and made over a fifteen year period, were first shown at The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in 2001, and published at the same time.

Although Douglas R. Nickel describes this book as a collection of portraits in his introductory essay, Joel Sternfeld's vivid images are so much more than traditional photographic portraiture. The pictures go beyond reflecting a mere image of the subject, no matter how interesting or aesthetic. And Sternfeld's subjects are more than the people being photographed. He has captured here the very essence of our culture - Americans, depicted in the context of their daily lives, during odd moments between events. Many of the warmest images feature relationships between two people.

Each photograph tell a story. The volume's cover portrait is titled "Young Man Gathering Shopping Carts." A teenager, with blond bobbed hair, open shirt, loosened tie, stands in a parking lot cluttered with pink shopping carts. The ubiquitous strip mall is the backdrop. His stance, the look of discontent on his face, and the generic locale say much more than most narratives. Sternfeld stirs the viewers imagination. One cannot help but wonder about the subjects' lives - the before and after of each picture. "A Lawyer with Laundry," New York, portrays a seemingly reluctant subject, laundry in hand, leaning against a newsstand while warily suffering the photographer's attention. Some of my other favorites include: a colorful sari wrapped middle-eastern woman pumping gas in Kansas City; a young woman with bouffant hair, wearing a cotton-candy pink jacket holding her pet rabbit in a plastic carrying case; a forlorn woman on a New York City street holding a spectacular Christmas wreath; a man grilling a single hamburger on a broken patio in Cincinnati; and
"Motorcyclists," which shows a man on a motorcycle, wearing goggles and a leather jacket, with an adorable baby in the sidecar wearing a helmet.

Douglas R. Nickel, who wrote the Introduction, is director of the Center for Creative Photography and associate professor of art history in the College of Fine Arts at the University of Arizona, Tucson. Ian Frazier, who contributed another fine essay is an author.

I don't usually buy coffee table books, although some of them are gorgeous. I have found that while I may admire the work a few times, I wind up placing the volume in a prominant place and then only glance at it occasionally, while dusting. This book is special though. "Stranger Passing" is a "travelogue of sorts, a detached, understated but compelling portrait of the people with whom Sternfeld has come into contact during his itinerant journeys." The photographer compels us to question the assumptions we make about others. This is an extraordinary book by an American master.
JANA

Joel Sternfeld travels the roads of America, and takes pictures with his large-format camera. Although all his pictures include people in various situations (attending a party, selling coffee, hanging out in their own homes, vacationing, promenading, relaxing, observing, working), what he is really interested in, is the depiction of landscapes and soft outplay of the mid-afternoon light. There is an overwhelming sense of loneliness. His composition style is superb; his depiction of quality of light reflections of the industrial surfaces is without precedence. In my opinion, Sternfeld really stands on its own. Not since Robert Frank's "The Americans" have I seen such a collection. His compositions are best reminiscent of Philip-Lorca diCorcia's; but somehow people are not the center of attention (and sometimes not even of focus), what is important is the quality of landscapes and how they shape human lives.

These sixty portraits of American strangers are rich with an intelligent, questioning beauty. I was dazzled by the exhibit in San Francisco, but now I'm especially glad to have the accompanying book. I rarely find it worthwhile to purchase museum exhibit catalogues, but what I love about "Stranger Passing" is that I can ponder a given image as long as I like, "reading and re-reading" it as I would a really good short story. Indeed, many of these portraits seem as laden with interpretive possibilities as a story by Chekhov or Alice Munro or T. C. Boyle. From a grizzled woman selling papers in the middle of a Colorado boulevard, to a solitary New York banker having dinner, his aloneness matched by a single tulip in front of his little bistro table: I found myself deeply moved by the lavish yet subtle artistry Sternfeld has bestowed on these people and places--each one unique yet somehow familiar--that he encountered in this strange and wonderful country of ours.

I remember the carnivals, but I was too young for the side-shows (some of them, anyway), and the book, with very good pictures, is an outstanding coverage of the genre. The book includes interviews with performers and patrons, to give you the flavor of the world you are reading about.

"Carnival Strippers" is a photographic documentary of the carnival strip shows that flourished in county fairs in small-town New England through the late 1970s. The book consists of photographs of the strippers, the managers, callers, and barkers who run the shows, and their customers, or "marks".

The book first appeared in 1976 and his long been out-of-print. The photographer, Susan Meiselas, was at the time a young woman just out of graduate school. She spent the summers of 1972 -- 1975 following the carnivals and in getting to know the women to photograph them and their environs. She at first offered her photographs and interviews to various feminist publications who turned them down.

Meiselas subsequently went on to a distinguished career as a documentary photographer working extensively in Central America and Kurdistan. In 1992, Meiselas was named a MacArthur fellow.

"Carnival Strippers" received attention upon its initial publication for its frank, but nonjudgmental portrayal of its tawdry subject. The book was made into two plays before it, like the carnival strip shows themselves disappeared from attention. Then, in 2000, the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City featured a retrospective of the photographs. The Whitney Museum published this second edition of "Carnival Strippers" in 2003 with Sylvia Wolf, curator of photography at the Museum contributing an essay. Deidre English of the Graduate School of Photojournalism at the University of California at Berkeley has also written an essay for the book.

In the 2003 edition, 16 new photographs are added from Meiselas's source materials and 13 photographs that appeared in the 1976 edition are deleted, making a total of 76 photographs in the book. The new edition is also rearranged from the initial text. There are two sections of photographs, the first called "the girl show" and the second called "portraits". The essays by Wolf and English draw parallels between Meiselas's work and the work of Brassi's 1930 photos of Paris prostitutes, as well as with the work of contemporary photographers such as Diane Arbus. To me the strongest parallel is Belloq's collection of photographs of prostitutes in Storyville, New Orleans dating from the turn of the century.

In the grainy black-and-white photographs of the life of the carnival strip shows, we meet the women and the barkers on the front stage called a "bally" enticing the men to enter the show. For a price of $2 or $3, the show consisted of four or five women each dancing naked to, generally, a single 45 rpm record. The book shows photos of the girls at work to crowds of leering men. The world of the "girl shows" was competitive and nasty.... We see the girls off-stage in dressing rooms and in private moments reflecting on their lives. There are extensive interviews with the strippers, the managers and barkers and the patrons. The book also comes with a CD featuring the sounds of the strip shows, interviews with the girls, and a 1997 interview with Susan Meiselas.

The book paints the picture of a low, tawdry life with mutual exploitation between the girls, their managers, and the patrons. Yet it is a way of life not without its fascination. It is a life of poor, mostly ignorant, and exploited women, but also a life based upon the rejection of convention and upon attempts to attain independence. Meiselas clearly became taken with the strippers, their attempt at independence, their eccentricities, their vulnerability, and their vulgarity. For Meiselas and her subjects, Carnival life is something that gets in the person, making it hard to leave when one has been exposed. I found the life of these now gone carnivals and girl shows got inside me as well in reading this book.

The women in this book are not beautiful, air-brushed models and the book has little to offer in the way of titillation. Meiselas tries to show the viewer and the reader the carnival life for what it was. The book shows a dark corner of the eternal theme of sexuality and love between men and women in all its difficulty and ambiguity....

As a small kid, I was always fascinated by the carnival strippers and the forbidden world behind the platform. Finally, these pictures outline what that world was like for those women who danced. No, the pictures aren't pretty, but realistic and honest. I came away from these pics with more respect for the kind of work that these ladies did. The world of the carnival stripper is gone, but these wonderful and gritty pictures allow us one more intimate look at an all but forgotten time period.

Frankly this book is incredible. I'm a carnival performer and history buff and in my opinion it's always been a tragedy that carnivals of yesteryear are remembered now almost entirely for the sideshows. Rides, games, spook houses and sex were all part of the classic carnival allure; this book is dedicated to the latter and portrays the Girlshow at it's best and most real.

Most impressive to me was the fact the author says almost nothing of her own opinions or ideas regarding the girls, the talkers or the lifestyle. Instead the reader is simply treated to the text of her interviews and therefore only the ideas of the people who performed and in some cases the people that watched.

As performer I was especially pleased to read in it's entirety an original Girlshow "talk" or "bally" at the front of the book, and I love the unabashed and often casual photos taken back stage, all of witch give one an insiders sense of what it must have been like in the glory days.

I wrote a letter to my kids comparing the ideals I recalled from my childhood and the sad things they've seen with Bush's war and so forth, and placed the letter at the front of this book before I wrapped it for each of them. I had the most wonderful feeling that I was a part of a more responsible, more positive future and that I was sharing that with my children. The book is very nice, filled with beautiful photography, and some good information, though I wish it were a bit more complete in its covering of Obama's life.

I bought this as a gift for a relative zealous about the Obama campaign. Reading it myself, and viewing the excellent photographs, I found it was really worth a read. I've read neither of Obama's two books, so can't compare.

This book is by Time Magazine, and the articles, interspersed with the photographs, also by Time's photographer, show Mr Obama from the beginning of his decision to run for President, to the night of the election victory.

Many of the narratives are simply articles taken from Time Magazine at the time things were occuring. They do not attempt to confuse; they have the actual date of the first publishing of the article in Time at the head of each article. Its interesting to see things with the "at the time" point of view. Most of the articles are really well written and thorough, looking fully at the incidents they are reporting.

My favorite was the section on Obama's childhood, his mother and grandparents. It has always bothered me that Mr Obama is ROUTINELY referred to as "Black" or "African-American" when he is in fact biracial, a sub-category that is increasing recognized by the young people of just such marriages as that of his parents. These young people, (one is a relative of mine) do not want to be seen as either "Black" or "White" in many cases. Obama, who grew up in multi-cultural Hawaii for most of his childhood, surely must have felt comfortable as a mixed-race person, and undoubtedly, until he reached Chicago, didn't feel he had to identify himself as entirely "Black".

In Chicago big-city politics, where the old ethnicities apply, he had to choose, and obviously chose to be "Black". Marrying an African-American Chicago-born and raised wife probably hardened the choice for him and made it permanent.

But now, as leader of the United States, he needs, in my opinion, to find himself again as a biracial or multi-cultural person, in order to lead everyone and not be perceived only as the "first Black president" etc.

The book is worth purchasing as a memento of great historical change; also worth reading. Great photographs.

I was so excited to get this awesome book delivered within 24 hours as promised! I paid a little extra for overnight delivery, but you can order it postage free and still receive it quickly, in plenty of time for holiday gift-giving. Time Magazine's "President Obama: The Path to the White House" is a beautiful book, accessible and enjoyable to both the politically savvy, or to any other reader.

From the large glossy picture of our soon-to-be president on the cover of the book, to the many photos of him throughout his life, we see a boadly smiling Barack, who exudes energy and optimism. Even as a child growing up in the often challenging circumstances of his family life--his Kenyan father left the family when he was a child, and his single-mom, rearing the boy the help of his grandparents lived under modest means, for example--Barack always had a huge smile on his face.

In addition to the pictorial history, this book consists of 10 articles which had appeared previously in the Time issues from Oct. 2006 through 17 Nov. 2008. These articles, by Time Magazine staff, are well-written and quite readable. Kudos also to Callie Shell, Time photographer who covered the campaign from 2006 on, and is responsible for most of the photography that comprise this book.

I think that this slim volume--just under 100 pages--will stand as an inspiring commemoration of an crucial historical time for the American people. The story of his "...Path to the White House", from humble beginnings up through his election to the presidency, is one that can give hope and meaning to life. It is a terrific and inspiring gift for anyone on your gift list this holiday season. Thank-you Amazon for making it available to your customers ahead of the scheduled publication date!

Watch Video Here: http://www.amazon.com/review/R3GIGTWETELWFQ I'm reviewing the paperback edition, which is essentially the same except the covers look different.

Time Magazine has produced a gem of a book in this special commemorative edition on President Barack Obama's election campaign.

The stories included are ones that have been published by Time over the months. They have, however, been given a change in title. The stories look not just at the campaign itself, but also at the life of Obama. Every piece is a wonderful read, quality as one would expect from Time.

Accompanying the stories are some really great photography and photojournalism. Each photo tells so much story in itself, such at the ones with Michelle Obama playing the hoops with her children while daddy looks on, or the one where daddy Obama walks his kids to school, or even my favourite one with Obama's well worn shoe in foreground (appears on the paperback edition).

The paper stock is low gloss and exceptionally white. The text and pictures are reproduced brilliantly.

Overall, this is a piece of history well worth collecting.

Wow. I had pre-ordered this last month, and hadn't expected it's release for several more weeks. What a nice surprise that is has been released early. I guess Time pushed out in time for Christmas. Anyway, this is great book to remember a historic election. The book is only 96 pages, and it is divided into 10 chapters. My favorite chapters are: "How he learned to win", and "Defeating Hillary". The book gives a nice timeline of Barack's rise to power. It is loaded with never seen before, behind the scenes photo's of Barack and his family. You get to see Barack Obama "the family man", as well as Barack Obama "the politician". Even if you didn't support Obama, this is still a great keepsake to remember an election like no other. This is a true collector's item, at a very modest price.

This book is a remarkable collection of Civil War images. They're striking, disgusting, personal, posed, spontaneous, beautiful, ugly, brutal, profound, fascinating or plain old interesting, extraordinary, run of the mill, boring, and with all of them this collection gives you an amazing glimpse of life. It's a smorgasbord of pictures, from people, to landscapes, to architecture, to machinery of war; the death and destruction, or the grandiosity and pomp, this has it all, and much more.

Even if you're a Civil War buff, you probably won't have seen most of these photographs. I believe there are about 1,000+ in this, and it's immensity and diversity bombards you with a continual, ongoing, and very varied glimpse into that time and that life (A note though, the focus of the book is 95% military, with very few photographs of civilians. They are in there, but usually in a military setting.) It doesn't take long to get through, I've managed in half an hour, and I've read it dozens of times now. The images pull you back, as there is always something to discover or appreciate or wonder at hidden inside the photo.

William Davis' commentary is pretty and emotional and light. He doesn't write a history lesson here, the photos take care of that, but enough to put things in perspective.

It's been said (over and over and over) that an image can speak a thousand words, and although it's a well worn cliche, it's one of the truest of cliches. I find that photographs, Civil War included, help me to have a greater understanding of the world, of history, because they almost reach in and suspend a moment for all time, and within that moment are cross-sections of existence. They can teach you as well, better in certain ways, as any lesson or research book or whatnot. "Touched By Fire" is no exception, and is one of the best Civil War books I own for it's sheer size and power and grand capturing of life during the Civil War.

In very few words, this book should be in the libraries of any serious reader of the civil war. The short stories coupled with the enomorous number of photographs is very comprehensive and educational. Great for readers of all ages. Jim Nichol

This is one of the better collections, between two covers, of Civil War photographs I have come across and own. There are well over 1000 black and white photographs in this rather thick and heavy volume, each being well annotated and described. The quality of the vast majority of these pictures is of excellent quality. The overall theme is of course military in nature, although there are quite a number of works featuring civilian homes, business, farms and such. Many of the photographs themselves were taken by some of the greats, Gardner, O'Sullivan, Edwards, Petty, Russell and Brady, but the unknown photographer and the assistants of these men are well represented.

I have looked at and examined many works from this era over the years, but found many photographs in this book that simply have never been published before. The book is broken down into various categories such as Around the War, The Embattled Continent, The Men in the Ranks, Ships and Seamen, Johnny Reb, Billy Yank, The Men who Led, and many, many others. I was particularly interested in the section dealing with ships and seamen. I am not particularly interested in Naval Warfare, but some of these pictures are absolutely fascinating and this book contains quite a large collection. Another aspect I found most helpful was the photographs in the actual uniforms of the warriors, both sides being represented. These actual pictures are so much more accurate, interesting and telling than many of the renditions by modern artists. So often the difference in "ideal" and "reality" is quite striking. As a collector of the artifacts of this particular war, I found this to be most helpful.

This work also includes numerous articles addressing various aspects of the war. Each of these short essays and informative background pieces are quite well done and contain much interesting information. While I am normally not a big fan of "coffee table books," I see no other format that could handle the data presented here. Most of the photographs are large enough for even old eyes like mine to see. The other aspect of this work I enjoyed, is that there is just enough questionable information that could be somewhat challenged, to keep the most diehard Civil War nit-picker in complete bliss. Now the questionable information found here is indeed questionable itself, and as to weather it is correct or incorrect is, for the most part, in they eye of the beholder. It is in the nature of Civil War Buffs to be so though, so this is fine.

All in all, this is a wonderful addition to any library concerning this event in our nation's history and I do highly recommend it. I like to leave through this one ever so often as with each reading I find something that I had previously missed.

If Civil War photographs are as fascinating to you as to me, this topically arranged volume has hundreds of examples for your perusal, many never seen before. The short essays range in quality from the well crafted to the pedantic, depending on their author's creativity. The captions also vary widely. Some reflect the critical eye of William Frassanito, the "photographic consultant," while others add little to the image and occasionally distract from it.

Uta Barth: In Between Places is a visually poetic catalogue produced in conjunction with an exhibition at the Henry Art Gallery in 2000. It is a stand alone work of art and a revealing reference about the artist. Containing a wealth of philosophical and methodological material, the questions Barth and the authors raise about her work persist beyond a one-time glance or read through.

If you are unfamiliar with Barth's work, the opening paragraph written by Curator Sheryl Conkelton provides an illuminating summary of Barth's progression and an examination of the formal conventions of image making in general. The three essays, authored by curators Sheryl Conkelton, Russell Ferguson and Timothy Martin compliment Barth's photographs by exploring perception as an active concept. Barth's artistic investigation is a visual equivalent to French philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty's The Phenomenology of Perception (1945) which expands upon the idea of awareness as an embodied intentionality whereby meaning is assigned to experience.

Viewing Barth's out of focus images requires an active engagement with vision. Ground #30 (1994) from her Ground series is a painterly monochromatic image with hints of light and shadow that merely suggest a room's corner with a window. The blurred familiar prompts a self-reflective inquiry into the experiential mundane. This participation in the act of viewing begins to create a relationship between self as subject and self as object. The empty, nearly abstract views quietly compel closer examination. There is a seductive solitude in the barely recognizable. Barth fuses this quality of silence with consciousness in order to return us to our own vision.

The deeply evocative photography of Uta Barth finds its match in this most excellent publication. Barth's imagery, purposefully blurred though it may be, is beautifully presented in this book, which is perfect in its scale and balance between word and image (kudos to the designer.) Three texts round out the mix: Russell Ferguson's take is, as always, critically incisive and highly engaging and Timothy Martin's reading is downright poetic (he writes about her work in terms of perception and phenomenology -- very convincing.) I also appreciated the interview with this very mysterious artist -- it really helped me gain insight into her practice. As for the price: art books with good production values, good work and good essays are hard to find. This one is well worth it.

At the risk of repeating what has already been said: this is a deeply intellectual and beautiful work by a significant artist. Ms. Barth presents a disciplined and challenging oeuvre. The prints are in color and the aesthetic rush is immediate. One should view Barth's work in a gallery, if only for the totality of the experience. The sheer size of her work; the impact of her triptychs and so forth, cannot be contained within the pages of a book. This book, however, successfully displays the painterly sensitivity that Barth brings to her camera work.

An absolutely astonishing book, "In Bewteen Places" is the record of the exhibition of Barth's work on display in Seattle's Henry Art Gallery, as well as a very thorough record of her development over the last ten years. Her elegant, unsettling, serene, engaging images are shown here in full plates as well as details, many of which are interspersed throughout the book's excellent critical commentary. The criticism is well-reasoned and intelligent, but the images themselves are ravishing. I own two of her photographs, and the reproductions here are superb. At a time when art books in general, and photography books in particular, are expensive exercises in self-indulgence that are often ludicrous puff-piece advertisements for the galleries that sell the work, this book is a shining exception. It's truly worth the cost, and I highly recommend it.

Anyone who has lived in the state of Vermont throughout the generations knows the kind of people portrayed in this book. Our grandparents and neighbors were these kind of people. Hard working, humble and just a bit sarcastic but a refreshing reminder of what many of us traditional Vermonters claim as heritage. Vermonter dot com heartily endorses this book and it's easy to see why.

Reading this book and seeing the photos (one of which is a character who used to deliver my firewood in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont) is somehow reassuring and a reminder of what really made Vermont famous. Now that Vermont has taken a very weird turn to the left, it has become an entirely different place to live. This book is a testimony to the true Vermont and it's people who are sadly fading into history. Thanks for the memories.

Growing up in Hudson Falls, a small town in upstate Ny near the Vermont border,it brought me back home, now that I live in Oklahoma. I have a sister that lives in Ludlow Vt. After reading the book and not visited there in such a long time, it took me back. The black & white photos have shown a technique that a lot of photographers have forgotten.The book was very well illistrated, the soft lights and shadows caught my eye in a sence that time has set still for that one split momet. I felt that Mr. Miller topped the cake with this book. I hope that he continues this type of work for a long time.

I didn't think I was going to like this book when I picked it up last night. The wife and I were staying in a friend's home outside Woodstock, VT, it was hot, the light was poor, and here I was starting a book about rural Vermonters. Mind you, I grew up in San Angelo, TX, and there are some intensely rural folk in that locale, but these were Yankees!

Suffice it to say, I read the book through last night, and looked it up on amazon.com today to see if I could buy a copy. It's beautifully written and photographed; you usually get one or the other, but Peter Miller gives you both. Buy it, then visit the area; it'll make you appreciate your soft life in the city.

Miller does a wonderful job highlighting the themes that thread through the lives of Real Vermonters. As a half-Vermonter (though I was born in Vermont, my father didn't move here until he was in 6th grade) everything that was said ressonated with me. Miller made clear the peculiar distintion us Vermonters make about who's a "flatlander" and who isn't. Miller included in his vingettes Real Vermonters that were not Native Vermonters, and showed that our state is not snobby, or eletist; for we do welcome out-of-staters, as long as they're willing to become Vermonters rather than forcing Vermont to become "New Conneticuit".

Reading this book made me miss the Vermont that I'm barely old enough to remember, and to weep at its loss. The black and white photos show a serious side to the Green Mountain State that tourists don't really care to see when they come visit in October. The way that Miller was able to work his way around central Vermont, and still keep many of the stories tied to one another forged together the distance of a country mile with the closeness of a neighbor.

Adorned with precious gems of Vermont history (did you know Vermont is home to the first ski mountain rop-tow? or the greatest moose-hereford love story of all time? ) Miller shows us with grace and humility the independant, unqiue, sincere and True Vermont

This book has crazy pics from all over. Perfect for your modern living space setup. Not for kids because it contains some nudity.

I bought this as a gift for my friend's herbal medicine shop and his customers love this book.

I have to keep yanking this back from my kids...an honest look at the world we rarely see or write about...let alone talk about. Nice peek into life.

The images, people, and wide range of topics make this an endlessly fascinating addition to your library.
Highly Recommended!

First off, if you are a fan of Vice, then you probably already own this book. And if you are a fan and don't, then shame on you! Second, this is a great book for anyone just interested in photography. It catalogs the history of Vice magazine through years worth of photography. It also has interviews and insights from nearly all of the contributors. There is a very large and varied collection of photos from both established photographers like Kern and McGinley, to up-and-comers like Warren. All in all, very high quality with some amazing imagery. A must have for modern photography lovers.

Viennese Types :: Wiener Typen is a remarkable compilation of the photographs taken by the late Dr. Emil Mayer in Vienna around 1910. A lawyer and photographer active around the turn of the century, Mayer's photographs are exceedingly rare because most of his prints were destroyed by the Gestapo after his death (Mayer and his wife, both Jews, committed suicide in June 1938, soon after the Anschluss). But two copies of a remarkable portfolio of his original prints survived the Holocausts, and it is this portfolio which has now been published by Blind River Editions, augmented with an informative essay by Edward Rosser and a foreword by Rudolf Arnheim. Viennese Types :: Wiener Typen is a unique and outstanding contribution to the history of photography in general, and the memorable, impressive, beautifully executed work of Emil Mayer in particular.

Despite its rather blunt title: VIENNA TYPES is Dr. Emil Mayer's surviving masterwork of street photography. The plates are deeply moving & offer glimpses into life in that grand old city of 100 years ago. Like a Sleeping Beauty aroused by the careful ministrations of Edward Rosser, this collection of exquisite photgraphs is timeless & evocative.

Edward Rosser unfolds the details of Dr. Emil Mayer's life & times, explaining how societies were in those days before two World Wars. He also describes the particular process, bromoil, which Dr. Mayer used.

Each plate demands to be gazed upon in quiet admiration, for their details as well as their composition. You can almost feel the fabrics of people's clothes, sense the vitality of the market, smell the horses, leather & tobacco, as everyday people go about their lives.

If you love photography, Rebeccasreads recommends VIENNA TYPES for its unique & enchanting look at a world long gone.

In photography when things turn out well it's often because there's been an especially graceful coalescence of art and science. The photography of Dr. Emil Mayer (the "Dr." was an honorary title in common use by lawyers in Austria) is a sublime example of that happy merging. Mayer was an enthusiastic practitioner, teacher, and proponent of bromoil process photography - a method that allows for a freedom of expression via a series of laborious chemical manipulations of the negative, and produces a monochrome print that has a softly grainy appearance, and a sort of quietude, in addition to effective, evocative painterly depth. From this collection and the essays that accompany it one comes to understand Mayer had the soul (and the eye) of an artist, and the patience and skill of a scientist. The results are terrific.

Rudolf Arnheim's Foreword offers an elegant preview of these atmospheric documentary photographs of a vanished time and place: turn-of-the-century Vienna, a city and a culture that has been called a "uniquely civilized world."

Edward Rosser's sensitive accompanying biographical essay, "The Life and Art of Dr. Emil Mayer," is both an appreciation and a fine critical piece. Mayer, a Jew, was born in 1871 in Bohemia. His family moved to prosperous, bourgeois Vienna when he was a child. He was well-educated, and became a lawyer and a passionate hobbyist photographer, leading a large Viennese amateur photography club for 20 years, from 1907 to 1927. Mayer published numerous monographs (some in the US) on bromoil process.

Rosser explains that Hitler's annexation of Austria intervened, however. In June 1938 Mayer and his wife committed suicide. Their possessions, including of course most of his photographs, were confiscated, lost, or destroyed. Rosser's essay elaborates: Many if not all of the Europeans who would have remembered him after the war fell victim to the Holocaust themselves. Mayer's disappearance, then, was nearly assured in a scenario replicated - unthinkably and by the millions - in our time.

But in fact Mayer's photographs were rediscovered, and the facts of his life reconstructed by the hard work and efforts of several people (credited in Rosser's essay).

The complete portfolio of the 51 photographs in this collection reside in the permanent collection of the Metropolitan Museum in New York. They are of everyday street life - a sort that vanished with the coming of the First World War. They are portraits: at least one interesting person is in each. People conduct all sorts of business on the streets. Horses pull wagons and coaches. (Most everyone wears a hat, a cap, or a kerchief - and aside from a group of men in bowlers, the hats are quite thrilling - to this modern eye). The cobblestone streets are for people, goods, and horses - and there are many. The profusion of things to buy and to sell, so emblematic of the bourgeois ideal that was Vienna, caught Mayer's eye - and caught mine, too.

This book engaged, challenged, and delighted me. Anyone with an interest in European street life at the turn of the century, in the deep and absorbing technique known as bromoil process, and the sensitive, artful, and deeply humane photography of a man who very nearly disappeared - will appreciate this fine book.

Images such as those found in "Viennese Types" render words superfluous. Capturing a time long past, a serene turn-of-the-century Vienna, Dr. Emil Mayer has preserved street scenes perfectly representing individuals often seen, such as sidewalk vendors, window shoppers, a scissors grinder, a carriage driver, and more. All of these photographs are artfully composed, beautifully rendered. Most amazing, perhaps, is the intimacy and sympathy these images convey. It is almost impossible to view them without being moved.

Born in 1871 in Bohemia, Dr. Mayer was a Jew who was the victim of Nazi oppression. Following his suicide at the age of 66, his possessions, including his photography collection, were lost. Thus, regrettably, little is left of his great work.

Nonetheless, "Viennese Types" is mute testimony to his photographic artistry. This is a rare volume, one to be treasured.