From Publishers Weekly
The subject of an upcoming retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Avedon long ago entered the canon of fashion photography and modern portraiture. His trademark images of people standing against white backdrops, at once unflinching and glamorous in their effect, have helped define our idea of celebrity itself (if Avedon shot them, they must be famous). This slipcased, accordion-fold collection of 50 black and white portraits from the past 50 years, produced for the exhibition and including an essay by curator Maria Morris Hambourg and Met research assistant Mia Fineman, as well as a brief word from the photographer himself, will do little to change Avedon's reputation. It offers, in essence, a greatest hits collection of well-known faces---Andy Warhol, William Burroughs, and that pale, hairless beekeeper covered in bugs. For those unfamiliar with Avedon's work, or for true completists, the classy package of tri-tone reproductions will prove enticing.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Book Description
For over 50 years, Richard Avedon (b. 1923) has captured the creative genius of our time with dazzling insight and incomparable style. Spanning the artist's entire career, from the late 1940s through his most recent work, Richard Avedon Portraits offers a superb selection of his photographic portraits.
With uncompromising directness, Avedon portrayed his subjects against a white background, with no extraneous details to distract from the essential specificity of face, gaze, dress, and gesture. This challenging innovation, coupled with the artist's intense interest in his subjects and mastery of his craft, resulted in mesmerizing portraits-among them Truman Capote, Willem de Kooning, Samuel Beckett, Francis Bacon, and Marilyn Monroe, as well as the uncelebrated Americans of his project, "In the American West"-that rival the greatest works in the portrait tradition.
Richard Avedon Portraits is published to accompany a major exhibition at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. With its innovative accordion-style design and superb reproductions, the book is a virtual stand-alone mini-exhibition in its own right.
