Volkswagen: A Week at the Factory [Paperback]

Peter Keetman (Author, Photographer)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 1993

One of the best-known and best-loved cars ever manufactured, the VW Bug was a symbol for decades of a casual lifestyle replete with breezy outings. But the 71 duotone photographs in this elegant paperbound volume offer a striking contrast to this populist impression. In 1953, photographer Peter Keetman spent a week at a Volkswagen factory in Wolfsburg, Germany, emerging with a collection of remarkable images that, although rejected by the Volkswagen publicists, transform the parts of the popular car into works of abstract art gleaming stacks of hoods and fenders trace sinuous lines reminiscent of Edward Weston's seashells; bolts of cable look like exotic plants; sheet metal takes on a life of its own. Arranged in the order of the car's manufacturing process, accompanied by three essays on photography and Volkswagen production, Volkswagen: A Week at the Factory is a landmark in the history of industrial photography and a timeless look at a contemporary icon.

Editorial Reviews

Language Notes

Text: English (translation)
Original Language: German

About the Author

Peter Keetman is a commercial and industrial photographer who has also published several books of landscape photography. In 1949, he was one of the original founders of the "fotoform" group of photographers, a predecessor of the international subjective photography movement. During the past several decades, he has had one-man shows in Germany and the United States. He lives and works in Breitbrunn-Chiemsee, Germany.

Product Details

• Paperback: 96 pages
• Publisher: Chronicle Books (January 1, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 081180268X
• ISBN-13: 978-0811802680
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 7.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #806,203 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars No one cares, October 21, 2000

By 

Hans Sprungfeld (Seattle WA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Volkswagen: A Week at the Factory (Paperback)

If you're even remotely interested in photography, you'll enjoy this book. You'll probably want to enlarge and frame many of the photos within. I bought a poster in a used record store taken from a page in this book, cropped a little on the edges, framed it and have a great wall hanging many people compliment and ask aboout. It didn't take long for me to check the fine print and determine from where it came. It had to be ordered as I'm sure It's not well-known. If this book were marketed however, it could target Volkswagen fanatics and, to a lesser degree, car nuts in general. It's fascinating and a little wierd to see the obsessive order in which all parts were stacked and stored. Also cool are the shots of seemingly endless rows of perfect, new VWs. Beetles and Buses in staight, orderly rows. My first car was a '68 beetle which I rolled, and later hit a deer in -the deer survived. Beetle ownership, however, is not needed to enjoy this book. And, if you're simply into displaying books and getting reactions, this represents the most bang-per-buck ever.