The photographer Philip-Lorca diCorcia is best known for his elaborately staged scenes made to look like real life, in which he meticulously plans every element of a shot-lighting, pose, etc, before taking the photograph, creating the "ur" moment. This is conceptual photography with the veneer of the documentary. As such, his photographs have been integral to contemporary dialogues on street photography, portraiture and constructed versus spontaneous tableaus. His most recent body of work, titled Heads, is a departure from this method. Setting up shop in New York City, diCorcia took unstaged pictures of passers by that follow in the street photography tradition of Paul Strand, Walker Evans, Harry Callahan and Robert Frank. DiCorcia's work helps to redefine the genre, bringing street photography into our postmodern world.
 Sell Back Your Copy for $109.75
Whether you buy it used on Amazon for $151.01 or somewhere else, you can sell it back through our Book Trade-In Program at the current price of $109.75.
Used Price$151.01
Trade-in Price$109.75
Price after
Trade-in$41.26 |
Book Description
Editorial Reviews
About the Author
Philip-Lorca diCorcia, born 1953, attended university at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and Yale University, New Haven. Since 1977, his work has been the subject of numerous one-person exhibitions. His photographs are in the collections of major institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
More About the Authors
Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Large, Gorgeous, Varied Photos of New Yorkers "Frozen" While Walking Down the Street,
By
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Philip-Lorca diCorcia: Heads (Hardcover)
The 10/2005 issue of Photo District News, a magazine for professional photographers, named this one of the "most captivating and influential photography books" from 1999-2004, so I thought I would buy a copy.
Published in conjunction with a 2001 PaceWildenstein Chelsea exhibition, the book is wide (38cm) and high (30cm). Except for the author & title, the dust jacket and hardcovers are black, befitting the book's contents. A two-page essay by Luc Sante explains that the photos of people "walking down the street" in New York City were taken "with a long lens" and hidden flashes. Because the artificial light was much brighter than the natural, the people appear lit like "stage shots," isolated against mostly black backgrounds. On the right-hand pages are 17 full-bleed photos of heads and shoulders of people of different ages and races, with differing clothing and facial expressions. The left-hand pages say "head #10," "head #05," etc. in apparently random order (e.g., Amazon.com shows #01, which appears toward the middle of the book). Although you can find small versions of many of the heads on the Web (e.g., #13 became famous in 2005 because the subject sued the photographer for selling it without his permission), these do not come close to the wonderful high-resolution reproductions in this book. Parr and Badger in "The Photobook: A History" define a photobook as having "each image placed so as to resonate with its fellows as the pages are turned, making the collective meaning more important than the images' individual meanings." This book meets that definition. For a given photo, its placement in the context of the 16 other photos enhances your appreciation of it; you want to compare and contrast the composition of one image with the others. Snap this book up at Amazon.com!
6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
good idea, but,
By jack kerr (northport, NY) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Philip-Lorca diCorcia: Heads (Hardcover)
i would check out luc delahaye's 'l'autre' before this for a more "pure" portrait technique, but these are fascinating, simple, and as ron burgundy might say, "compelling and rich."
still, the book has only 40 or so pages, and not a great deal because of it.
4.0 out of 5 stars
needless lawsuits,
This review is from: Philip-Lorca diCorcia: Heads (Hardcover)
Philip-Lorca diCorcia photographs the banal. His images alway feel like something we've seen before. For instance a man looking into his fridge illuminated by the fluorescent glow of the refrigerator's light bulb or a person walking down the street staring directly foreword paying attention only to what is in front of him. Like Stephen Shore or even Gregory Crewdson, diCorcia expands our idea of photographing the ordinary and gives his images a type of dramatic iconization.
Heads, the title of one of diCorcia's series is precisely that. Heads suspended in time, in motion, and in thought. diCorcia captures these suspended moments with strobes hidden in street scaffolding, firing brighter than the ambient daylight. They turn the background nearly black exposing only the subject who has walked into diCordia's trap. The contraption is triggered when diCorcia's chosen subject steps on an unmarked "X." Freezing moments and expression, we the viewer's are able to examine the precise moment that has been recorded. Walking alone, but surrounded by others, the subject is completely in their own world. Deep in contemplation on anything and everything, from grocery lists to lustful revenge, the subject's facial expressions and postures are frozen and isolated. Heads becomes a sort of universe, similar to the stars we are able to examine night by night through telescopes, only these have been fixed by diCorcia's long lens. More than just pictures of unknown subjects, the photographs become mirrors in which we are able to discover the reflections of our own unguarded gaze.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
