Berenice Abbott: Changing New York [Paperback]

Berenice Abbott (Author), Bonnie Yochelson (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 1, 1999

Now in paperback, the highly acclaimed, definitive collection of Abbott's popular New York photographs. Berenice Abbott (1898-1991) was one of this century's greatest photographers, and her New York City images have come to define 1930's New York. The response to The New Press's landmark hardcover publication of Berenice Abbott: Changing New York was extraordinary. In addition to receiving rave reviews, it was chosen a best book of the year by the Wall Street Journal, Business Week, and New York Newsday, and was featured in Vanity Fair, Newsweek, and the New York Daily News. A midwesterner who came to New York in 1918, Abbott moved to Paris in 1921 and worked as Man Ray's photographic assistant. Inspired by French photographer Atget, Abbott returned to America in 1929 to photograph New York City. With the financial support of the Works Progress Administration's Federal Art Project from 1935 to 1939, she was able to realize her ambition to document a "changing New York," a project that remains the centerpiece of her career. Now available for the first time in an affordable paperback edition, Berenice Abbott features more than 300 duotones, arranged geographically in eight sections tracing the photographer's New York City odyssey. It also includes 113 variant images, line drawings, and period maps, as well as an explanatory text, which explores Abbott's compositional choices, her artistic and historical preoccupations, and the history of New York.

Features:
- 307 duotones--the complete WPA project--more than 200 published here for the first time
- 113 halftones and line drawings, including period maps, technical drawings, and alternate prints
- An introductory essay on the life and work of Berenice Abbott
- Extended annotations distilled from the never-before-accessed WPA field notes

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

To celebrate the centennial of Abbott's birth, the author has curated this show comprising the Museum of the City of New York's collection of 200 of the 307 prints that Abbott made between 1935 and 1939 in New York City with the support of the Works Progress Administration. Organized in eight geographical sections (e.g., Lower East Side, Greenwich Village, and Outer Boroughs), Abbott's views of New York contribute greatly to the documentation of the social, commercial, and architectural history of the city. Eugene Atget's approach to documenting cities with sparsely populated views of streets and shop fronts clearly shaped Abbott's own work in documenting New York City. Yochelson lays out such facts and analyses in an exceptionally well-written and carefully researched text that provides the most complete story to date of Abbott's life, artistic influences, and photographic contributions. The endnotes on each photograph are detailed and will be useful to photographers and city historians alike. Highly recommended for large academic and public libraries and for collections that specialize in the history of photography or New York City.?Kathleen Collins, Bank of America Archives, San Francisco
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From The New Yorker

These canonical photographs have never before been so well presented. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 400 pages
• Publisher: New Press, The (December 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1565845560
• ISBN-13: 978-1565845565
• Product Dimensions: 12.1 x 9.1 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #296,697 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the Finest Collections of New York City Photographs, November 30, 2000

By 

Donald Mitchell "Jesus Loves You!" (Thanks for Providing My Reviews over 109,000 Helpful Votes Globally) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Berenice Abbott: Changing New York (Paperback)

This book is a great choice for those who love great photography, Berenice Abbott fans, those who are interested in the history of New York in the 1930s, and those who would like to enjoy a little nostalgia about their formative years in that magnificent city.

Berenice Abbott returned from 8 years in Europe at age 30 in January 1929, planning on a short stay. Instead, she was transfixed by the changes in the New York City scene, and became obsessed by the opportunity to capture it photographically. For the next 10 years this was her focus.

During the depths of the Depression, she was able to obtain a grant from the WPA to work with the Museum of the City of New York to create an exhaustive photographic essay of the city. This book contains the finest flowers of that remarkable assignment in 305 black and white photographs, a biographical essay about Abbott, maps of where the photographs were taken, and extensive notes on the locations and the photographic perspectives used.

The biographical essay was made more interesting by describing Abbott's strenuous financial and promotional efforts to support Atget's collection, while staving off poverty herself. The many fights over how to do the New York City project also make good reading as background for the images. Independent by nature, that quality of Abbott's probably improved the result in this case.

The presentation of the images is organized around the different geographical sections of Manhattan and the other boroughs, especially Brooklyn. As a result, you get a sense of neighborhoods as well as of individual images and locations.

As someone who learned photography from Man Ray, Abbott is a good student of abstract methods, and she subtly captures the surreal and the predominant design feeling contained in these subjects. Her works that are most like Man Ray's were the ones that most attracted me. I am very impressed by the encyclopedic knowledge that she must have developed of New York City to locate so many rewarding sights for us to consider.

My only quibble about the book was that in some sections the reproduction was too dark, so that details were unnecessarily lost that would have been of interest. But the page sizes were good for the images being presented, the design is solid, and the overall print quality was good.

My favorite images in the book were:

Immigration Building, Ellis Island

Theoline, Pier 11, East River

Tugboats, Pier 11, East River

City Arabesque

Brooklyn Bridge with Pier 21, Pennsylvania Railroad

Henry Street

Manhattan Bridge

Gunsmith

Hot Dog Stand

Wrought Iron Ornament

Doorway, 204 West 13th Street

Fifth Avenue Theatre, Orchestra, Boxes, First and Second Balconies

Father Duffy [wrapped like a Christo], Times Square

Gramercy Park West, Nos. 3-4

J.P. Morgan House

Murray Hill Hotel, Spiral

Billie's Bar

Wheelock House

Watuppa, from Brooklyn Waterfront

Even though your photography may not be as good as you like, there is a lot of human value in making such a pictoral history of where you live. You can use this volume to get ideas for compositions and shooting angles. In this way, you can deepen your appreciation for Abbott's work.

Capture the important truths around you for all to see!

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This book is perfect, December 12, 1997

By 

Elsa Dorfman (Cambridge, MA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Berenice Abbott: Changing New York (Hardcover)

This book is wonderful. The author has produced a perfect book. It is very faithful to Abbott's vision. Abbott has an unerring eye. Notice all the signage. It is everywhere. On sides of buildings. In windows. Above buildings on the roof. By comparison, we live in a visually impoverished age.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Like a porthole view of old New York, December 16, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: Berenice Abbott: Changing New York (Hardcover)

This book is a fascinating pictorial history of New York during the '30s as shown through the beautiful duotone plates that Bernice Abbott took between 1935-1939. These pictures were taken as part of the Work's Progress Administration sponsorship of the arts. The clarity of the pictures combined with the excellent reproduction in the book makes this a must have for anyone who wants to see exactly what New York was like right after the Depression and before the war. It is like stepping back in time and seeing life as it was. The high contrast of the plates brings out tremendous details and these pictures beg for closer examination to really pick up the feel of the era - the signs in the windows for 10 cent haircuts or the hardware store with all of the goods splayed out on the street with handmade signs showing the prices. All of this adds to the visual wonder of this book. This book is far more than a coffee table edition. It is a reference unlike any other about New York.