Walker Evans: Signs (Getty Trust Publications, J. Paul Getty Museum) (Hardcover)

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

For many people, Walker Evans's name conjures up visions of the rural American South of the 1930s, where the photographer made some of his most notable images. But signs--marking buildings; advertising grocery prices, churches, and cabarets; communicating political messages--transfixed him throughout his life. Evans was interested in all aspects of signs, from the typography and graphic layout to the messages they conveyed and the objects themselves. He collected nearly as many of them as he photographed and often exhibited actual signs alongside his photos. Andrei Codrescu, in the essay he wrote to accompany the images in Signs, offers a concise explanation of the power of this subject matter. He writes that Evans's era was, "the time of popular writing, of huge advertisements, of lettering that invaded every nook and cranny and even wrote the skyline. America wrote big, with bold new alphabets, in lightbulbs, in neon, in smoke. One could follow the text of twentieth-century America from coast to coast...."

This small book is beautifully designed. The 50 gelatin silver prints selected from the Getty Museum's collection are reproduced on full pages with little or no cropping, and are meticulously documented at the back of the book with notations on dimensions, dates the photos were shot, and printing dates. A wide range of images, from the Photographer's Window Display, in which miniature portraits are displayed behind a pane of glass on which the word studio is painted, to a pair of commercially produced movie posters advertising a double feature of The Man from Guntown and I Hate Women, offers readers perspective on the breadth of Evans's vision. This focused look at an element of Evans's photography helps broaden the understanding of his entire body of work.

From Library Journal

These two books honoring the great American photographer Walker Evans differ in reproduction value and selection. Signs would be slight and disappointing without the excellent text by Romanian poet and National Public Radio commentator Codrescu. The unifying idea for this book?photos that represent Evans's lifelong affection for signs?feels original and yet ultimately limiting as you flip through marvelous black-and-white images like "Roadside Stand Near Birmingham" (1936) and "What, No Garters?" (1946). Visually, the idea probably works more powerfully within the confines of the J. Paul Getty Museum exhibition. Considered purely as a kind of slide show for Codrescu's text, however, the photographs work ably. While it also contains many old favorites, Simple Secrets doesn't limit inclusion by theme. The catalog of a traveling exhibition launched by Atlanta's High Museum of Art, it has plenty of signage but includes much of the rest of the world Evans rendered so memorably. Well-known pictures seem somehow more surprising here. These photos are from the magnificent Hill Collection, which spans five decades of Evans's work, starting with his shadow self-portrait from 1927. The reproductions and layout are superior to that of Signs, and Walker's subway faces, blind musicians, and old men on porches have rarely looked better. Thirteen of the Hill Collection's photographs have never been published. Recommended for all photography collections.?Nathan Ward, "Library Journal"
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 96 pages
• Publisher: Getty Publications (September 3, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0892363762
• ISBN-13: 978-0892363766
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 7.9 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #88,294 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Just Beautiful!, June 21, 2000

By	christina mann (Chicago,IL) - See all my reviews

Walker Evans SIGNS are unique and wonderful. These images glow in there black and white surroundings. Some of the images are simple and delicate and other are busy and loud...a great mixure.Codrescu's essays give you a delightful walk through of Evans life.Andrei has an original insight... description of these signs from our past.There is excitment in these essays...energy in which Evans must have had as he photographed these images.As you read on you will see Evans attraction to signs. I also enjoyed the layout of the book. The images have room to breath and the text is perfect. I was very happy to add this book with my collection of photography books.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Graphics / Black & White fans MUST BUY, December 28, 2002

By A Customer

Another beautiful collection from Walker Evans, showing his greatest photos of billboards, movie posters, newspaper headlines, theater marquees, graffiti, street signs, hand-painted shop frotns, covering 1920-1975. You will discover variety of ways to interpret the different layers of meanings from his photos with striking impression. It provides an excellent documentary about American culture. Walker Evans also collected and exhibited signs, sometimes next to his photographs, which brings his work into another level. From letters to graphics, from graphics to signs, sometimes people is becoming helpless under the mass media. Highly recommended for graphics / black and white fans.