Chambre Close [Paperback]

Serge Bramley (Author), Bettina Rheims (Photographer)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1998

Snow was falling over Paris when an elderly, elegant gentleman with gaunt cheeks and pale skin opened the door to a photo gallery in the sixth arrondissement...

Monseiur X is a perfectly discreet voyeur, a seducer of the Old School. Well educated and wealthy, he owns a complete set of photographic equipment and an obsessive curiosity about the female body.

The artistic collaboration of photographer Bettina Rheims and writer/art critic Serge Bramly began in 1991 with Chambre Close, which Schirmer/Mosel is publishing for the first time. It lives off the stimulating contrast between text and images. The cultivated literary tone of Monsieur X's fictional "confessions" is set against photographs that speak a far clearer language. Bettina Rheims has a command of this language, which tells of female eroticism and exhibitionism as no one else does.

--This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Editorial Reviews

Language Notes

Text: English (translation)
Original Language: French --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Bettina Rheims, born in Paris in 1952, is best known for her women portraits exhibited widely in Europe, the US, and Japan. An award-winning photographer, she regularly shoots commercials for major fashion labels.

Serge Bramly, born in Tunis in 1949, is a Paris-based writer, art critic, and photo historian. The author of a celebrated Leonardo da Vinci biography, he is best known for his long-time collaboration with Bettina Rheims.

--This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 144 pages
• Publisher: Gina Kehayoff Pub (October 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 3929078392
• ISBN-13: 978-3929078398
• Product Dimensions: 10.8 x 8.8 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #8,431,936 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A beautiful and fun trip about living out a fantasy, November 8, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Chambre Close: Fiction (Paperback)

I was in Amsterdam recently, and searched for a book of nude and erotic photographs of beautiful and elegant European women, with a correspondingly pleasing text. This book is a delight from cover to cover; the pictures have a slightly amateurish, perverse quality that makes them even more real; the text is sexy and teasing without sleaze, cliches or misogyny. The work shows a fascinating relationship between photographer and subject, where every model is a unique erotic being, and you can feel the photographers obsession with capturing their images. Fun, classy, sexy and surprising, a worthy member of any photgraphy book collection.

20 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Looking for something interesting? Look elsewhere., June 7, 2000

By 

Robert E. Froese (Houghton, MI USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Chambre Close: Fiction (Paperback)

I've searched bookstores for creative compilations of nudes with limited success. With size comes diversity, and Chambre Close is an example of the range of products you can find at an on-line bookstore. Unfortunately, Rheims and Bramley's compilation illustrates the lower end of the spectrum.

The book is nice enough at first glance... the images are clear and different enough from the stock, headless abstract black and white nudes that are so common. They quickly become tiring, however, with stilted composition, overly simplistic lighting and a kind of bland consistency that makes them easily forgetable. After one pass (and skimming some of the text previously noted as bland) I knew this book was heading back to the retailer for a refund.

It isn't that the book is of low quality. Rather, there is just so much more creative and interesting material available (of better quality) at the same price. Adding this book to your collection is like padding a composition with text. While technically sound it is superfluous and detracts from nudes as a genre.

10 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Intimacy of the (Fe)male Gaze, October 16, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Chambre Close: Fiction (Paperback)

I have been a fan of Ms. Rheims practically from my first exposure to her work & when this book came out, it strengthened my convictions of her vision. Since then, I have continually reveled in her approach to portraiture w/ this book, in the fact that Ms. Rheims is able to capture a sense of intimacy w/ her subjects usually reserved for one's lover(s) & Mr. Bramley's prose if wistful, Romantic & bittersweet.