Heroines [Paperback]

Ken Dietrich-Campbell (Author), Patricia Canning (Author), Elaine Allen (Author), Lincoln Clarkes (Photographer), Barbara Hodgson (Foreword)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1895636450 | ISBN-13: 978-1895636451 | Publication Date: November 1, 2002 | Edition: 1

Winner of the City of Vancouver Book Award

The Heroines Series is an epic photographic documentary of the addicted women of Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. In 1997, fashion and portrait photographer Lincoln Clarkes turned his lens away from the world of glamour and began documenting the dire circumstances being endured by the marginalized women living and working on the streets of Vancouver’s most troubled neighbourhood. The Heroines Series consists of over 400 portraits of addicted women in Vancouver’s notorious Downtown Eastside, and has garnered national and international media attention. Peace Arch Entertainment produced a one-hour documentary film, Heroines: A Photographic Obsession, earlier this year for BRAVO! and Women’s Television Network. The film "e;is a study in pain and intimacy, artistic expression fuelled by passion and moral outrage"e; and is accompanied by original poems written and narrated by Susan Musgrave. The documentary opened the Leipzig Documentary Film Festival and has been screened at several other festivals since its premiere in June of 2001.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Barbara Hodgson is a book designer and author. Her non-fiction works include: In the Arms of Morpheus: The Tragic History of Luadanum, Morphine and Patent Medicines—a fascinating yet unsettling account of medical opium in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries—and Opium: A Portrait of the Heavenly Demon, an exquisitely designed book that perfectly evokes the insidious allure and devastating dangers of opium smoking.

Lincoln Clarkes is an award-winning photographer (National Magazine Awards, Silver; Western Magazine Awards, Gold) who has worked in fashion while living in London and Paris, and photographed numerous celebrities, including Deborah Harry, Helmut Newton, Noam Chomsky, Lucinda Williams, and Oliver Stone. Mr. Clarkes has had solo shows in Vancouver, Toronto, and Victoria, and over a dozen group shows across the country. His photography has appeared in Details, People, The Globe & Mail, The National Post, The Vancouver Sun, Geist, Western Living, Saturday Night, High Times, subTerrain, and British Cosmo.

Product Details

• Paperback: 152 pages
• Publisher: Anvil Press; 1 edition (November 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1895636450
• ISBN-13: 978-1895636451
• Product Dimensions: 7 x 6.3 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,116,679 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Astonishing Stuff, December 8, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Heroines (Paperback)

These photographs by Lincoln Clarkes in this amazing book will change the way people look at Canada in general and Vancouver in particular. These are friendly and exquisite black and white photographs of drug-addicted women who live and work (usually as prostitutes) in Vancouver's downtown eastside neighborhood, a neighborhood unique in all the world for bearing the majority of an entire nation's overdose deaths, if not drug traffic as well. Clarkes captures the humanity and the artistry, as well as the desperation, of these women ... and of the city, too, which now must look at itself in different way. Heroines really is an epic work of photography and of social documentary.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars You can't ingnore them anymore.., August 12, 2007

By 

M. Henriquez "EastVanSista" (Las Vegas, NV) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Heroines (Paperback)

I grew up in this neighborhood, knew a lot of these women so I may be a little biased, but I LOVE THIS BOOK.
In Vancouver, people try to hard to ignore this part of town, to ignore the people in this part of town, make believe that this problem does not exist in their "perfect" city.
Vancouver is beautiful, but obviously there's a problem.
This book makes it impossible to ignore that fact.
You see the girls as people, as beautiful women, as someones sister, daughter or mother.
They're vulnerable and hurting and you can't ignore them anymore..

5.0 out of 5 stars Friend of the Family, December 11, 2003

By 

"canadianebi" (North Vancouver) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Heroines (Paperback)

The book is a telling glimpse into the lives of some of the women of the Vancouver Downtown Eastside.
As a community worker with hard-to-house ex-psychiatric residents in the area, in the 1980s I ran a Women's Group to address the risk of AIDS in relation to prostitution.
The dying wish of a long term dear friend of mine was that I remain in contact with his two daughters. This book available at the Vancouver Public Library--and the excellent video of the same name that aired on TV available at Douglas College that includes an interview with her--give me a means to follow the career of his youngest daughter. I hope to hear from her again soon, and hope she is alright.
Now I'll go ahead and buy the book. If only I could discover whether the video is available for sale to the public.