Customer Reviews

Sleeping By the Mississippi

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Alec Soth builds on the tradition established by William Eggleston, Stephen Shore and Joel Sternfeld. But Soth dramatically moves beyond these masters by presenting a more eccentric cast of characters, a stronger thematic melody and a more personal insight.

Soth's photographic journey down the Mississippi evokes a boyish sense of adventure. Dreams, flight, religion, race, sex and unusual personalities appear repeatedly in the work, often in subtle allusion. The young photographer captures a rainbow of quirky characters defining a life filled with rich personal meaning outside the mainstream of cultural or artistic norms, locations, institutions and without significant financial expense.

The book's forty-six pictures reflect a richness of detail possible with Soth's 8 x 10 inch camera. Each page offers a title on the left and the work on the right. Photographers Notes at the end of the book hint at the depth within Soth's work. Essays by Patricia Hampl and Anne Wilkes Tucker complete this wonderful Steidl publication.

The Whitney Bienniel 2004 prominently featured Soth's work, which has been acclaimed by the critics and will be embraced by the broader public as this young photographer becomes better known. A spectacular body of work, Sleeping by the Mississippi places Soth squarely at the front of young American photographers continuing to move art forward.

Alec Soth captures the world in a way every bit as solid and exciting as Walker Evans and Diane Arbus. The book is solid in content and publishing quality and would fit comfortably in almost anyone's library. This young photographer is going places. Watch his star rise over the next few years!

this work is solid, beautiful, and thoughtful, but if you are interested in this kind of work you should first get Eggleston's Guide, Stephen Shore's "Uncommon Places," and especially Joel Sternfeld's "American Prospects" which this book seems to pick up from. but in all honesty, those books are not only better, groundbreaking (this is not groundbreaking work), and significant in an art/photo history context, they did so 30 years ago at a time when color photography was still seen as nothing to be taken seriously.

so, buy this book, but only after the others. this is 'friends', go buy seinfeld first.

Following the path of Sternfeld and Eggleston, Alec Soth achieves originality, honesty and identity. If you associate this great photography with a superb printing quality (remember it's a Steidl edition), you get a marvelous art object.
[...]

There's absolutely no doubt that this book is a classic and Alec Soth is a master of color photography. Looking through the book everything works together as a whole and individually the images are beautiful. The book production is top quality in this 3rd edition and comes with my highest recommendation. If you like Stephen Shore and William Eggleston then this will fit right in with your collection.

I'm glad to finally own an Alec Soth book. I can study these photographs many times and never get bored of them. All I can say is that I wish I could shoot as well as he does.

The Mississippi is as american as it gets, and has never been explored photographically in quite this intimate a way. The book is good, but not as good as some other books out there in this genre of large format color american road pictures. Seek deeper.

While this MAY not stand up to JOEL STERNFELD, STEPHEN SHORE, RICHARD MISRACH, ETC. (the people SOTH has been compared to by OTHERS) it is about as good as anything contemporary that's going around. 8x10 COLOR may not be unique at this point, but soth's work is a nice addition to the genre.