Lee Friedlander: Letters From The People [Hardcover]

Lee Friedlander (Photographer)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 2, 1993

A classic book by master photographer Lee Friedlander. "... a wonderful lesson in the art of looking closely.... Friedlander has produced a photographic essay that testifies... to his virtuosity." -- Newsweek

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Like Friedlander's Nudes , Letters is about seeing photographically and is full of the strange, surreal found imagery, the jarring montages (really superimpositions in space), and the surgical framing that are Friedlander trademarks. The immediate subject is writing in public places--printed, painted, or hand-scrawled--that appears here first as single letters in alphabetical order, then, successively, numerals, combinations of numerals, and combinations of letters in signs and graffiti that contain messages of anger, violence, religion, sex, and love. There is no overall narrative, but the progression from elements to messages builds into a complexity of significance, ending with a graffito full of the lonely longing most graffiti betray: "Everyday I calls a phone to her. Every night I dreams for her." Thus a universal story is reflected, one that may be something of a projection of Friedlander's own mind, as, of course, are all these "letters from the people." Friedlander's work has always been best in books. Unsurprisingly, this one is superb--lavishly oversize, featuring page layouts of greater variety, and more complexly paced, as it were, than his other books. Gretchen Garner

Product Details

• Hardcover: 88 pages
• Publisher: D.A.P./Distributed Art Publishers, Inc.; First Edition edition (October 2, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1881616053
• ISBN-13: 978-1881616054
• Product Dimensions: 14.8 x 13.7 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,838,214 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

0 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A rather sumptuous looking over-indulgence, May 21, 2011

By 

Robin Benson - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Lee Friedlander: Letters From The People (Hardcover)

I thought this was a bit of an enigma of a book. On the one hand its 88 pages are huge (13.25 by 14.5 inches) with 213 photos beautifully printed in Italy by Amilcare Pizzi using 300 screen tritones but on the other hand the visual contents don't really justify this production opulence. Friedlander's Desert Seen photos would have looked stunning in a book of this size and production.

The editorial format is nicely worked out: the first eighty-seven photos are cropped images of the alphabet in capitals followed by numbers and an ampersand. The rest of the photos are combinations of letters merging into graffiti statements and by their nature these tend to be personal to the scribblers and instantly forgettable to everyone else.

Because the photos are mostly close-ups of the letters the words cannot be read and there is no opportunity to enjoy Friedlander's playful knack of layering a composition into the distance with all sorts of fascinating distractions for the eye.

The contents would have worked equally well in a book a quarter of the page size and the prices charged on the net are as over-indulged as the contents.

###LOOK AT SOME INSIDE PAGES by clicking 'customer images' under the cover.