This month is rich with many different styles of photographers and photography. From stark black and white to garrish colour, from historical to contemporary, documentary to studio.
New Zealand photography gets a very respectable representation too, from visual accounts of Edmund Hillary’s feats to Marti Friedlander’s autobiography, not forgetting two unique books on animals, with heartwarming stories of dogs who have lived through the Christchurch earthquakes and the fascinating photographic account of the first 37 days of some tui fledglings.
The world of entertainment and glamour is well served with beautiful photography collections from Lee Miller, Terry O’Neill and contemporary prodigy Søren Solkær Starbird.
Finally, if you are looking for inspiration to create gifts that involve photography, look no further, A Beautiful Mess is sure to give you some cool ideas making the most of your cellphone camera. And it is linked to a very cool blog too.
The conquest of Everest : original photographs from the legendary first ascent
“On 29 May 1953 Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay stood on the summit of Mount Everest … anniversary book … features a trove of original photographs … and other rare materials from the Lowe collection … contributions from the late Sir Edmund Hillary, Sir Chris Bonington, Kenton Cool, Peter Hillary, Tom Hornbein, Reinhold Messner, Colin Monteath, Jan Morris, Norbu Tenzing Norgay, Doug Scott and Stephen Venables.” (Syndetics summary)
Lee Miller in fashion
“Lee Miller was a Vogue cover girl, Man Ray’s lover, the first photojournalist at the liberation of Dachau and Buchenwald, and one of the most important female photographers of the 20th century. Combining fine art and urban wit, her photographic technique was learned from the great photographers of her day, among them are Edward Steichen, Man Ray and George Hoyningen-Huene. Becky E. Conekin’s Lee Miller in Fashion gives us a wide lens view on Miller’s fashion photography. Set against the fast-changing landscapes of New York, Paris, and London, it reveals a neglected chapter in Miller’s life: how this incredible woman challenged conventions and broke boundaries in her fashion photography for the leading magazines of the day. Using never-before-seen photographs and archival research, Conekin shows how Miller’s fashion photographs were a brilliant combination of sharp wit, high art and modernist edge.” (Syndetics summary)
Self-portrait / Marti Friedlander with Hugo Manson
“From a childhood in London’s East End to half a century in New Zealand photographing wine-makers, artists, children and kuia, Marti Friedlander has lived a rich life, one defined by the art of looking. In Self-portrait, Marti tells her story for the first time. As forthright and revealing in words as in her photographs, she tells of growing up in London orphanages, being Jewish, working in a Kensington photography studio, marrying a New Zealander and moving across the world to a challenging new country. Here she began to photograph the ordinary and the extraordinary, protests and politicians, balloons and beaches, capturing on film the transformation of New Zealand life over more than fifty years. This book is a rich meditation on one women’s photographic journey through the twentieth century.” (Syndetics summary)
John Cato: retrospective
“In his photographic essays, Cato explores the harsh beauty and spiritual force of the outback. His images, fashioned from the extreme light and shade of the southern sun, have an almost sculptural intensity: a termite-ridden fence-post pierced with rusty-wire, the wind-furrowed surface of a water hole, the twisted bark of a gum tree. They are beautiful pictures, realised with great technical control, but Cato is not content to see himself merely as an ‘artist’ or a ‘photographer’. He describes himself – in his beliefs – as an ‘animist’: I believe that rocks have souls just as much as people. I think the word that has been used about my work which pleases me the most, is elemental, and it is that element of life within the landscape that to some is a deep religious experience. It is a vision that he traces back to the mythology of the Ancient Greeks, but it has interesting resonances, too, with the beliefs of the Australian aboriginals and the practice of their art.” (Syndetics summary)
Terry O’Neill
“Terry O’Neill has captured the iconic, candid and unguarded moments of the famous and notorious for six decades. He was the first photographer to observe the tectonic social and cultural shifts occuring across Britain as the nation emerged from post-war fatigue and in particular he chronicled how youth hijacked fashion, the arts and music to herald an era that became universally acclaimed as the Swinging 60s. He pioneered reportage photography of emerging bands like The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and The Animals, talent-spotted new icons such as Elton John and David Bowie and very quickly became the photographer of choice of many Hollywood stars, from Frank Sinatra and Audrey Hepburn to Raquel Welch and Paul Newman. He remains the only photographer to have photographed every James Bond actor, more htan 25 Bond girls and a staggering 150 Oscar-nominated actors and actresses. Now, for the first time, an exhaustive cataloguing of his archive conducted over the last three years has revisited more than two million negatives and has unearthed many unseen images, from Ava Gardner to Amy Winehouse, and Winston Churchill to Nelson Mandela. Every photograph was carefully selected by the artist himself to represent the scale and breadth of an unparalleled career.” (Book cover)
Closer : Søren Solkær Starbird
“Over the past decade, Søren Starbird has captured breathtaking photographs of the world’s leading musicians. CLOSR collects the work of this talented Danish artist who has risen to astronomical heights in the world of international photography. His portraits, ranging from deep and intimate studies to large format cinematic scenes shot in mind-blowing locations, have been published as features and on the covers of the world’s leading magazines such as Q, GQ, Arena, Rolling Stone and Wallpaper.” (From book jacket)
Tui – A nest in the bush
“This book is an intimate and rare look at the beginning of a Tui’ life, presented as a series of photographs showing the 37-day development of a pair of tui from eggs to fledglings.
Meg Lipscombe is a photographer living at Lake Tarawera nesr Rotorua, surrounded by native forest and an abundant variety of bird life. One spring morning in 2011, Meg noticed a tui disappear into a bush with a twig in its mouth, and discovered that its nest, while hidden from below, could be seen from her balcony. By carefully removing some leaves from the bush she was able to get a clear view of the nest, giving her a rare opportunity to visually record the beginning of a tui’s life.
The growth and development of tui chicks has never been photographed in this way before, and this beautiful sequence of photographs will have great appeal to anyone, young and old, who appreciates this much loved and iconic bird.” (Book jacket)
Quake dogs
“Strange-but-true Christchurch earthquake dog stories… includes stories of USAR dogs that worked in the central city right after the February earthquake; Guinness, the unofficial mascot of the Student Volunteer Army; Nemo, who has a special gift for predicting earthquakes; dogs who were rescued and dogs who rescued others; and stories showing dogs’ uncanny knowledge when trying to find their owners.” (Book cover)
A beautiful mess : photo idea book : 95 inspiring ideas for photographing your friends, your world, and yourself
“Sisters Elsie and Emma share their love o photographing their everyday life with95 favorite tips and ideas for documenting your own real life with any camera or smartphone. Packed with the same happy, creative spirit and unique style that has made their blog, A Beautiful Mess one of the most popular DIY style websites in the world, these all-new projects and photo challenges will inspire you to style and snap better photos and then transform them into simple yet stunning projects and gifts.” (Adapted from book jacket)
Color Rush – American photography from Stieglitz to Sherman
“From this color saturated world we live in nowadays, it is hard to believe that there was a time when color photography was not the norm. This book explores the developments that led to this point, looking at the way color photographs circulated and appeared at the time of their making. From magazine pages to gallery walls, from advertisement to photojournalism, Color Rush charts the history of color photography in the United States from the moment the technology became available. At the start is the unveiling of the autochrome in 1907, the first commercially availaable color process and continues through the 1981 landmark survey show and book, The New Color Photography, which hailed the widespread acceptance of color art photography. This book was published by Aperture to accompany the exhibition of the same name, held by Milwaukee Art Museum earlier this year.” (Adapted from book cover)