Snap : Photographs by David Sprigle (Hardcover)

by Stephen Patrick Foery (Editor), Arthur Tress (Introduction), David Sprigle (Photographer)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"Sprigle's images are extremely intimate ... the dark lighting, the flaws and the blurred images... add ...dimension ..." -- Gay People's Chronicle, Cleveland, OH February 2, 2000

"These bodies, caught undressing, holding up their hard cocks for our admiration, are captured as pure sexual impulse." -- Jim Eigo, Playguy Magazine, June 2004

Product Description
In SNAP, Sprigle fundamentally changes the way we understand the beauty of the accidental moment. These images of rough elegance are reminiscent of the attenuated figures, movement and tension of Baroque Paintings. Yet, the characteristics are random--products of ostensible lighting conditions. The photos, Sprigle's newest series, are a visual essay about our instant culture. About a new aesthetic that arises from the intersection of cheap consumer technology and art. He presents a sanctioned voyeurism: reality tightly cropped, frontally composed and blurred by time to become unexpectedly beautiful. His color pallet, seemingly based in oil paint rather then photographic grain, is drawn from the Impressionistic Masters. Sprigle's work examines the way light rearranges an almost-classical memory of the human form.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 96 pages
• Publisher: Fotofactory Pr (November 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1883923417
• ISBN-13: 978-1883923419
• Product Dimensions: 10.3 x 8.2 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,243,931 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars "A Touch of Impressionism", June 12, 2002

By	Joseph J. Hanssen "Joe" (Upstate New York) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

I think my attraction to impressionistic oil paintings was the main reason I was drawn to this exciting book of Polaroid photos of mostly male nude models (a few females are included) by David Sprigle. In viewing impressionistic paintings, there is always that feeling of visual discovery when you back away from the landscape/portrait and realize the clarity that is taking place in front of your very eyes. The blurred becomes the beautiful image. Well, that's certainly true in this exciting book of instant photos David has taken of his subjects, people who are not celebrities but everyday men and women, whom he has asked to have some fun in front of his camera by jumping up and down, posing, and intimately touching their bodies. What you get as a result is not just a candid photo but an image that is almost like an impressionistic painting. It's simply beautiful and pleasing to the eye. These are bold images of excited models that demand your complete attention.

This is a very special book because it features a new style and type of photography of the male nude. There are over 50 pages of instant color photos in this book. There is a creative introduction by Arthur Tress that is quite interesting. This book is beautifully bound, and printed by Fotofactory Press, a company that David started back in 1990. As a avid collector of male nude photography books, I know that each and every book carefully selected and published by FotoFactory is of high quality, perfectly bound and printed on quality paper. Highly Recommended! Be sure to check out these other FotoFactory Press male nude photography books; California Boys, The Wild Ones, Male of the Species, and the Anthology Series, Volume 1-4, featuring many different photographs of this genre.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fun with Point and Click, June 17, 2002

By	scribbler1 "scribbler1" (Stone Mountain, GA USA) - See all my reviews

In the post-modern art world, a cheap Polaroid camera is all one needs to become a master photographer. Well, that and people who are willing to take off their clothes and move around while you're shooting them.

In "Snap," David Sprigle's very interesting collection of such photos, the subjects gleefully strip and masturbate, strip and jump up and down, strip and move doing almost anything while they are the focus of Sprigle's lens. The often blurry results are sometimes erotic (which works) and sometimes hard to comprehend (which doesn't always). But that is only the critical first judgment of the eye - take a second, less critical approach, and comparisons to Impressionism and oil paintings can be made.

Like all unposed photography, "Snap" captures the raw, unselfconscious moments of human behavior so convincingly and beautifully that it raises voyeurism to the level of art. Whether is an image of a man sitting on a toilet or the rather large genitalia of an anonymous subject swinging between his legs, the moments captured by Sprigle are real and unguarded. His models unabashedly perform seemingly mundane tasks, like lighting a cigarette, and with Sprigle's artistry, the act is elevated to a new level.

Though Sprigle's work may be influenced by our "instant culture," these images and their beauty recall older art forms like Impressionism, but the grainy Polaroid film (and burgeoning erections) tinge them with a modern quality.

The inner jacket of the book features a quote by Brassai: "Beauty is not the intent of creation, but the reward." It's a perfect statement to represent this collection by Sprigle, in which art comes first, and the results are a secondary concern. Happily, the results in this case are quite rewarding.

5.0 out of 5 stars From the Publisher & a Critic, August 20, 2005

By	Earl R. Sutton "earlsutton" (Detroit, MI, USA) - See all my reviews

"David Sprigle's unique images in SNAP, are the most experimental and abstract published by FotoFactory Press. Using a 'ordinary' Polaroid camera, Sprigle captures everyday people in everyday situations. These are not famous people or perfect models, but regular folk engaging in daily rituals from waking up to making love to sharing a cigarette. Images of women are included here.

"'Sprigle's images are extremely intimate and the dark lighting, the flaws and the blurred images of motion being captured, adds a multitude of dimension to his images. Sprigle's work cannot be glanced over like mush of the eye candy around. Rather one has to stare long at these images and creep under the layers to get at the heart of these images. And rough as these photos seem, there is a luminescent beauty to them as they celebrate the daily minutia of living as part of the human species.'--Kaizaad Kotwal

"Longtime friend and fellow photographer Arthur Tress introduces this 96-page clothbound volume which also includes a provocative essay on Sprigle's cultural significance by filmmaker Stephen Patrick Foery."

49 Color Plates