5 comments about Cindy Sherman: Retrospective.

1. A good retrospective of Cindy Sherman.
   Decent printing and good editing.



2. I saw the Retrospective show at the Art Gallery of Ontario back in 1999 and bought the book right after at the gallery bookstore. I later went back and saw the show two more times and also read the book from cover to cover. IT IS FABULOUS. It is no wonder Cindy Sherman is considered to be one of the top ten most influential artists of the 20th century. I especially love the notes in the book, showing how she arranges her ideas, how she deliberately uses feminism and ideas that are disgusting in order to make her social statements. Her artwork is deliberately controversial and its not for all people. (Jerry Falwell once said that Sherman was "spawn of the devil", but who actually listens to him?) But if you like controversy and if you like artwork that makes you think, buy this book. - A Fellow Artist.



3. The images protrayed in the book come form a warped and sick mind and I believe that they are very degrading to women. No way would I recommend anyone to buy this book, or even call it art. Ever heard the saying "if you lay with dogs you get fleas" well if you want to sink into the gutter this is your book!



4. Just recieved this item, the book gets 4 stars for layout and image quality, a good art book. The book gets 2 stars for the quality of the work it contains.

   If you like Sherman than this is a good book for you,though I'd suggest re-evaluating you asthetic awarness :) If your looking for great art look elsewhere. Sherman is an overhyped artist. Popular because her work fits into the politically correct agendas and philosophies of the contemporary artworld, not because the work is good. Just read one of the reviews here. The book contains some good peices, some that are atleast interesting but far to many fall into the just plain bad category as represented in this book.

   While recently attending a group critique an undergradute ceramics major stated she was a "process orientated" artist(said with artsy fartsy flair to make up for the fact she really didn't have anything to show). Sherman reminds me of her, a bad contemporary cliche masking itself behind feminist artworld dogma. If thats what you want, look at Jenny Saville, atleast she is a good painter, even if her content is often trite.




5. I can't believe it's taken this long for a compilation of Cindy Sherman's body of work to appear. But maybe that's the real measure of a major artist in this place at this time. Sherman is one of the strongest,most meticulous and most original artists to appear since the early 1930s. I'm not going to analyze the photographs, they've been analyzed to death and are far beyond analysis in any case. Suffice to say the quality and layout are excellent. A thrilling book! I do have one reservation which has nothing to do with CS. The accompanying essays are highly ideological (which CS ain't) and serve Sherman far less than their own agendas plus at least one of them is almost unreadable mumbo jumbo.

1 comments about The Allure of Women.

1. A beautiful Book full of beautiful photos of Real, alluring Women, before the age of silicone and cookie cutter appearances.

5 comments about A Short Course in Canon PowerShot S3 IS Photography book/ebook.

1. This book presents it self as a self teach book, it is just another manual. I recommend not wast int you money.



2. I fully agree with L. Satin's review. The manual that comes lwith the camera is inadequate unless you are already familiar with digital cameras.
   
   If you own the Canon S3 IS you need this this book



3. Nobody should ever write a technical manual without a thorough, alphabetical index at the end. If I want to find out about making movies with this camera, I should be able to find it in seconds by looking up the word Movie. No such luck here. The author includes what he calls an "index" on page vi, but it's actually just a table of contents, organized by page number. So, in order to answer my movie question, I have to scan through fifty entries until I come to "Capturing Movies". Dumb, dumb, dumb.
   
   I was also irritated by the section on Image Stabilization, a feature of the camera that Canon thought important enough to include in the name of the camera (the IS part). The author tells us how to select one of the three settings for image stabilization, but gives us no clue why you would want one setting over another. I found out by reading the Canon supplied manual. Why did I buy this book again?
   
   This manual does have some good sections and it contains many useful tips (if you can find them). However,for the whopping price of forty dollars, I would expect a much more detailed, professionally organized product than this. More of a glorified pamphlet than a user's manual.



4. A very good book that taught me a lot about not only the Powershot S3 IS but also about digital photography. Put in a very systematic way and an easy to grasp way. I love the CD and their animation web site although a bit slow.
   I recommend this book highly because the original user guide only explains the functions of each option. This book however explains why and what to do with that function.



5. I recently bought this item despite the negative reviews posted previously by two other purchasers. I think these two reviews were not fair to the book. First, it is not the case that the book discusses the RAW format, and second, an eBook was not included with my camera when I purchased it. In fact, both the book and the CD that come with the order are valuable and some of us (still) prefer books. In this case you can have your cake and eat it too. The book covers many key aspects of the features of the Canon 3S IS camera and I think that unless you enjoy reading the small manual that came with the camera, this book will definitely be an asset to you and will facilitate your learning how to use the camera and take better pictures. The illustrations are good and the text is clearly written.
   
   So, if you own a Canon Powershot 3S IS I think you will NOT be disappointed by this book and CD. Yes, it is not cheap, true, but the CD alone is 20 dollars from their web site. The book is nicely done.

5 comments about The North American Indian: The Complete Portfolios.

1. This book is an indispensable reference for any artist who aspires to paint or draw Native Americans as part of their Western art if they want an authentic representation of those forgotten times.
   
   [As an aside, I managed to find a hardback copy of this book, so they are out there if one looks hard enough for one.]



2. Edward Sheriff Curtis dedicated his life's work to documenting the customs and lifeways of the Native American peoples of North America. This extraordinary book includes some of the best photographic examples from Curtis' twenty volume masterpiece, "The North American Indian," one of the most significant representations of traditional indigenous culture ever produced.
   
   Curtis was one of two official photographers for the 1899 Harriman expedition to Alaska.
   On his return, he stopped in northern Montana, accompanied by George Bird Grinell, editor of Forest and Stream. There he witnesses the deeply sacred Sundance of the Piegan and Blackfoot tribes, a sight which transformed his life. Grinell said to him at that time, "Take a good look. We're not going to see this kind of thing much longer. It already belongs to the past". It became clear to him then, that he was to record, with pen and camera, the life of the North American Indian.
   
   Beginning in 1900 and continuing over the next thirty years, Edward S. Curtis, sometimes called the "Shadow Catcher" by tribes' people, took over 40,000 photographs and recorded ethnographic information from over eighty American Indian tribal groups, ranging from the Eskimo or Inuit people in the North to the Hopi people of the Southwest. In the end, the work comprised twenty textual volumes and twenty portfolios with over 2,000 illustrations
   They are organized by tribes and culture areas, encompassing the Great Plains, Great Basin, Plateau Region, Southwest, California, Pacific Northwest, and Alaska. Featured here are some of the photographer's most impressive pictures, including: seal-hunting Eskimos of Nunivak Island, portraits of three Piegan chiefs on horseback, portraits of Chief Red Cloud, Ogalala Sioux, Geronimo, Chief Joseph, Nez Perce, the magnificent Canon de Chelly, (Navaho), and one of my favorites, Kotsuis and Hohhuq - Nakoaktok - 2 masked performers in a winter dance.
   
   These reproductions are a precious American legacy and an artistic masterpiece worthy of any collection.
   JANA



3. This book contains the best black/white images from the original complete collection. The portraits of Indian and the past moment of their daily life were captured with their character and dignity.

   It is a marvelous image collection (Edward spent 30 years to make this 20-volume encyclopedia) of history. It represents the love of the dying population, and records the broken dream of native Indian.




4. This is an incredible collection of pictures. Piles on piles of pictures. But... The pictures are small. I was hoping for a collection of large pictures(i.e. 8x10) but the majority of them are approximately 4x5. It's a wonderful book, but don't expect full sized images. Irregardless it's a great buy for the price. You'll have a hard time finding a collection of pictures as big as this(even if the pictures are small) :)



5. absolutely stunning recollection of his complete photos. the reproductions are somewhat small, but easily viewable. such a complete set is so awe inspiring, anyone who has an interest or a love for native ameircan history/american history must have this book. absolute beauty.

4 comments about Edward Weston: A Legacy.

1. Being very fond of Mr. Weston's photography, I have seen several books of his work. This is the best to date that I have had the pleasure to review. His landscapes constitute the preponderance of this collection, and they are shown at a size large enough to enable the many fine details in them to stand out. This man had the eye for natural design that sets apart inspiration from the rest.
   
   In addition to his wonderful landscapes, there are nudes; a number of portraits; some shells and other artifacts of nature; industrial designs; and some unusual subjects, such as that of a dead man on the ground, clothed and in apparent repose. I found the shots Weston took of Death Valley at distance to be especially compelling, and his Point Lobos photographs also superb.
   
   If you love Weston's work, you will adore this book.



2. If you don't have any photography book with Weston's pictures, get this one... You will get perfect selection of pictures well printed. It's almost fundamental book for everyone interested in photography.



3. Edward Weston, more than any other photographer that I admire and have studied, succeeded in creating photography as art. His abstract and voluptuous landscapes of the human form, his photographic sculptures of organic matter, his special vision that captured unnoticed works of art in nature, bring extraordinary passion and life to black and white photography. His exploration of "the universality of basic form" has provided us with masterpieces of photographic art. Much of Weston's best work is featured in this large and exquisite book. Published in London in association with the Huntington Library, printed and bound in Italy, and issued on fine paper approaching photographic print quality, this book is certainly a wonderful legacy of Edward Weston and his work.

   In 1937 and 1938, the Guggenheim Foundation paid Weston to take a two-year photographic trip though California and the West - he was the first photographer to be awarded a Guggenheim fellowship - the images he made during that trip - more than 500, were presented to the Huntington Library. "What it all comes to is this," Weston wrote the Guggenheim Foundation in 1939, "I want very much to have a collection in the Huntington Library and will do anything I can to make it possible." "Edward Weston: A Legacy" organizes much of this material - extensive commentary, notes, biographical information and career-long examples of Weston's photographs. It is a truly stunning compilation.

   Weston's work evokes warmth, sensuality, the erotic. There is passion behind his photographs of animals, like the fleet fox, his portraits, and in his strange visions of antique statuary. His nudes, especially the extraordinary work he does with Charis Wilson, take the viewer beyond the erotic to a discovery of eternal forms.

   This is a magnificent book containing a master's work - a real treasure!
   JANA




4. Edward Weston gave more that 500 of his favorite works to the Huntington Library. Note books and other written material complete a major collection. This book is a major attempt to organize and say something meaningful about a prolific, private genius. I haven't read it all but I've already learned a lot and I've studied Weston for 40 years. The reproductions and their display as 8X10 contact prints is one of the most astonishing feats of printing I've ever seen, especially the nudes of Charis Wilson and the incredible sand dunes at Oceano. There are many photos that I have never seen, many I have seen and some I've held in my hand. This gives me the perspective to say that this book is worth buying just for the prints. You'll think as I have that you missed something until now, especially if all you've seen is book prints. This is as close you'll come to the real thing in print. I've sat buried in this book for half an hour, afraid to breath.

3 comments about Look at Me.

1. Look At Me is a masterpiece in moments. Phillip keel has taken his eye and put into a book some of the most impressing pictures of real life. Makes you want to hop in a car and search for this type of reality!



2. The work of Swiss-born photographer, writer, and director Philipp Keel seems to emerge from a ceaseless curiosity for people and their environment. In his work there is a refreshing fascination for things which allow us to explore and get in touch with people--be it humor, visual images, writing, brainstorming, or simply having a conversation. In the strong and expressive portraits of Look At Me, we see the powerful result of a belief that the camera serves as the key to people's spaces and their souls.

   The works collected in this finely printed monograph are filled with a depth and beauty that recall classical art. More important, however, is the straightforward honesty of the photographs. We see Philipp Keel immersing himself in the lives that surround him. The clear and personal imagery of Look at Me is truly cathartic in a photographic world that has become all too hard.




3. Philipp Keel is a wonderful photographer,true artist whose soulfull work is displayed wonderfully in this book. 5 star all the way baby! K.P.

No comments about Duchamp, Man Ray, Picabia.

1 comments about Touch.

1. It takes a uniquely talented, seasoned master of photography like Jeff Palmer to convey a sense that is generally best experienced in person and translate it so meaningfully to another sense entirely.
   
   In this book, the tactile experience of caresses, rubs, embraces and more is eloquently captured, evoking the emotions associated with these physical sensations in an almost inevitable way: the rush of feeling when a loved one brushes you as he walks by, the light touch of a supportive hand on the back of your neck, and yes - the pleasures found by self-touch.
   
   Jeff Palmer's beloved black and white is anything but cold and unemotional, thriving without warm color by the intense heat of physical closeness. Like the light frisson that often accompanies an intimate stroke of a finger, these images will surprise you with their quiet yet potent sensuality.

2 comments about Andres Serrano America: And Other Work.

1. There is something irresistibly uplifting about Serrano's "America", which tempted me to buy this book after a single quick perusal. It's a bit like Pierre et Gilles meet Avedon: a technicolor version of "In the American West". People from all walks of life, bums and celebs, priests and porn actresses, are portrayed in close up and in dazzling color; pure eyecandy, and also a brilliant sourcebook for artists. More is not needed to make this book enjoyable and worthwhile, but the parallel with Avedon's classic does show up Serrano's main limitation: superficiality. There is an attempt at deeper implications by the juxtapositions of portraits: the plastic surgeon and the butcher; the high school principal and the high school dropout; Larry Flynt and Bill O'Reilly; the WW2 veteran and the neo_Nazi. But as these examples make clear, the message never rises above the trivial (except perhaps once, inadvertently, where America's Little Yankee Miss 2003 is shown opposite Anna Nicole Smith...).
   The second half of the book is dedicated to other series. Unfortunately these hover precariously between banality, vulgarity and sheer tastelessness, regularly lapsing into one or the other. As his infamous "Piss Christ" (also featured) proved, Serrano is one of those artists who cannot quite distinguish shock value from artistic impact. And there sure are some easy shockers here: a toddler dangling from a noose; a menstruating woman spreadeagled in a chair; a man being urinated in the mouth; and most disturbing of all, several images of mutilated or burnt corpses in a morgue. Of course such images have a strong impact; but that has little to do with their artistic qualities, and everything with their subject matter. In that regard the "Bodily Fluids" and "Immersions" series, being more abstract, are in my opinion actually more succesful, even though the idea behind the former again strikes me as too obvious, and the latter as juvenile. But whatever your respons, this book does represent a body of work that has an accepted place in modern photography and deserves to be seen. Serrano could not have wished for a more lavishly produced volume.



2. Don't recognize the name of artist Andres Serrano? You should he is one of this country's most surveyed modern artists, responsible for such controversies as "Piss Christ", and for a modern movement of controversial art. Serrano enjoys creating extraordinary situations from ordinary daily living, and Andres Serrano, America: And Other Work excels in presenting his greatest achievement: three years of work producing over a hundred 50x60 inch photos representing the melting pot of America as seen through Serrano's art. Anticipate often-startling images of people in striking, full-page displays.

2 comments about LoveSong: The Erotic Photographs of Arnold Skolnick.

1. A current resident of Massachusetts, Arnold Skolnick first gained notoriety as the graphic designer who created the infamous dove & guitar poster for the 1969 Woodstock rock festival. During this same period, in the early 1970's he crafted an epic body of work showcasing the sexual union of man and woman. Although a few of these photos were exhibited at the Neikrug Gallery in 1973, this work was largely set aside by Skolnick, mostly out of fear (people were still being prosecuted for distributing sexual materials).
   
   But now, in teaming up with Quantuck Lane Press, Skolnick has published this almost forgotten work in a stupendous satin bound book designed for collectors and limited to only 3,000 copies. It features 85 tritone photographs that are breathtakingly beautiful. The human sexual dynamic is featured here in all its tender, beautiful glory. There is a realistic quality to this work that makes it all the more striking. Each duo are entwined in each others form, engaged in what seems to be real, genuine lovemaking. These subjects are not fitness buffs or even professional-looking models, but appear to be real-life lovers. And this makes it all the more exciting.
   
   Skolnick's imagery will almost certainly remind one of sculptor, Rodin's work (as noted by a critic of the Neikrug exhibit) more than anything one would see in a stag film. This book is a magnificent tribute to both its subject matter as well as the artist himself. This is one production that all collectors of fine art photography will want.



2. Any one book is two objects at minimum, maybe more. This first presents itself as a luxurious object, plainly hard-bound and slip-cased in elegant, silky cloth coverings. Dense printing adds drama to each B&W picture, on bright and glarefree paper. The paper's density prevents any picture from being impaired by another visually bleeding through from the back. Design serves the imagery well - a factor you might not appreciate until you've seen a book where layout actually interferes with the content. Just this once, I might have recommended the European affectation of putting the copyright notices at the back. Before you even open it, the physical presence of this book prepares you for its sensual content.
   
   The second aspect, the content, keeps the promise made by the format. I don't know the exact number of photos - probably seventy or eighty - but that hardly matters. Each one is a jewel. Each features one couple, intimately engaged. This is love-making, in all of the common ways for a man and woman to try to become one being. These pictures languished since the 1970s (they were too hot even for Playboy back then), but the imagery carries almost nothing of that time - just its hair styles. Only now did Skolnick feel that an audience could accept this work. Because of that inherent time-travel, the timelessness of figure and conjunction truly stand out.
   
   I recommend this to any couple who values their coupling, and who wants art that celebrates their own experience. This documents the deep beauty of the human animal, as Nature invites these handsome people into the ongoing act of Creation.
   
   -- wiredweird