Andreas Gursky - Hardcover

Söntgen, Beate; Zimmer, Nina

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 3775720197 ISBN 13: 9783775720199

Publisher: Hatje Cantz, 2008

Synopsis

Famed worldwide for his epically proportioned photographs, Andreas Gursky is one of very few contemporary artists able to represent cultures of excessive information--which he does through images of supermarket wares, crowds, trash, architecture and nature. The extreme detail of Gursky's final image--achieved by digital restructuring--produces a vertiginous effect on the viewer, as it oscillates between total representation and total abstraction. It could be said that Gursky updates the eighteenth-century sublime for our times.
This publication surveys the artist's most recent creations, on display at the renowned Kunstmuseum Basel throughout the winter of 2007/2008. Two new groups of works in particular, one on Formula 1 races and the other on the famous Arirang Festival (a closely choreographed mass spectacle in North Korea's capital of Pyongyang), are gathered here.

About this title

About the Author:

PETER GALASSI is chief curator of the Department of Photography at the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Among his recent books and exhibitions are Walker Evans and Company and American Photography: 1890-1965.

From Library Journal:

Gursky's retrospective at New York's Museum of Modern Art this spring (now showing in Chicago) was just the latest achievement by this German photographer, ranked among the half-dozen most important art photographers now working. Galassi, MOMA's chief photography curator, does an excellent job of tracing the artist's influences and development in his engaging essay. Moreover, the illustrations of work by his mentors, especially Bernd and Hilla Becher, as well as of his own early work, commercial work, and school projects, are highly informative. The 59 large-format plates (48 of them from the 1990s) forming the catalog that follows concentrate on his mature themes: massive and empty modern buildings, crowded public spaces filled with frenetic, impersonal activity, and landscapes that most often look at a built topology. The combination of his unique, painterly use of the camera and his ability to capture the beehive of contemporary society (whether the images are occupied or not) rightfully have earned him his current position. This best available overview is highly recommended for all libraries. Eric Bryant, "Library Journal"
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Hatje Cantz
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 3775720197
• ISBN 13: 9783775720199
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 128