Weston: 125 photos book on sale on Amazon

[Darin Boville]

$150, normally $200 at Amazon. Went on sale at 7:30 via their lightning deals. You have about ten minutes to get the deal before it sells out. Good luck!

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1934429570?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER

Look in the top right corner of page for deal info.

--Darin

[QT Luong]

I am curious about the selection of images compared with the Lodima book. Anyone seen both ?

[karl french]

Me too.

[Darin Boville]

It's sitting here in a box so I can't tell you anything yet. Check back on Jan 7th. :)

But if I recall correctly the Lodima book is from a single collection while this book is not.

--Darin

[QT Luong]

Darin, you recall correctly, moreover it was a private collection, hence my interest in the new book, although the Lodima is extremely well printed.

[BarryS]

Thanks for the heads-up. I was really tempted, but have been building up my photo library with used books and $150 goes a long way. Enjoy your copy and let us know how you like it.

[QT Luong]

I received the following by a contributor who prefers to remain anonymous:

"I have both the Lodima book and the new one. I am most disappointed with the new one. The book contains all the usual suspects--virtually nothing I haven't seen numerous times before as all prints are from the CCP collection. In addition, the essay reads like it was written by an advanced high school student with no original thoughts, insights, or research. All that wouldn't be so bad if not for the quality of the printing. Indifferent to poor is my assessment. While most new books, the Lodima included, attempt to make platinum look like platinum and to make glossy look glossy, there is no such attempt here. What's worse is the reproduction of Springtime, 1943 with Charis behind the screened window at Wildcat Hill. I have Kim Weston's print of that along with two other book reproductions. The new book's reproduction is the worst of all three--there is some kind of moire thing going on with the screen. All I can say is I'm glad I paid "only" $180 for it and not the $200 they want for it now at Amazon. In retrospect, even the bright gold slipcase is garish. The Vivian Maier book by the same publisher (Ammo) is superior at a fraction of the price.

I would see the new book as being a "greatest hits" kind of volume--most have been published elsewhere numerous times. That doesn't mean that the "classic" Westons are not represented well in the Lodima book such as the Oceano and other nudes of Charis, Death Valley dunes, Pepper #30, Excusado, and some shell images and well-known portraits. But there are many "rarities" in the Lodima book not at all represented in the new one.

The interesting thing to me is that the Center for Creative Photography collection from which the new book's prints were taken, is not in any way exhaustive. I own Amy Conger's survey of the CCP collection and was struck by the number of well-known images not represented there.

So to sum up, I see the new book, printing issues aside, as being a good all-round introduction to Weston, but one might be better off to acquire a variety of books (second hand) that would give a more rounded view. I recommend the two Weston's Westons books, one on nudes and portraits and one on California and the West; Margarethe Mather and Edward Weston: A Passionate Collaboration; Tina Modotti and Edward Weston: The Mexico Years; and Edward Weston: Photography and Modernism.

On another note, I mentioned that I have a Kim Weston print of Spring, 1943 which is poorly printed in the new book and well printed in The Last Years in Carmel. I was struck by the glow of the contact print and the detail where you can clearly make out the fact that Charis's arms are pressed against the screen in a couple of places. I placed a 10x magnifying glass on the print and was shocked to be able to see the fabric of the screen--all the little wires crisscrossing were crystal clear. It's a mush in the reproductions, of course. Thus the lure of the contact print! "

[karl french]

Well, this is very informative. Thank you for posting it.

[tgtaylor]

A few years back I purchased Edward Weston: A Legacy from Borders with a hefty (40% off) coupon. I miss Borders. It's the only Ed Weston book that I have and it's excellent. I just checked amazon and it's now selling for $175 used and $575 new so it was a very good investment.

Thomas

[Merg Ross]

I received the Lodima book from Dody shortly after release a few years ago, and believe that the reproductions are from her former collection of Edward Weston prints. She sold her collection, and the prints are reproductions from the subsequent purchase of that sale. Many were acquired during her time as an assistant to Edward. As with all of the Lodima books, Michael and Paula are on press and this one is superlative in reproduction.

The current book is a bit of a puzzle. The publicity surrounding pre-publication showed the iconic Weston images, most of which would be hard to surpass in quality after the Lodima publication. The timing is also strange, as this is Brett's centennial year. In fact, there will be a gathering in Carmel this Friday (December 16) to commemorate his 100th birthday.

I also have a print by Kim from Edward's negative that you reference, and it is indeed stunning. I was raised on Edward Weston contact prints!

[Darin Boville]

I received the following by a contributor who prefers to remain anonymous:

"I have both the Lodima book and the new one. I am most disappointed with the new one. The book contains all the usual suspects--virtually nothing I haven't seen numerous times before as all prints are from the CCP collection. .......

I would see the new book as being a "greatest hits" kind of volume--most have been published elsewhere numerous times.

I've been meaning to get back to this thread. I did receive this book as a gift and after flipping through it I'm a little taken aback by the anonymous comments that QT posted.

I'm something of a Weston fan and have several books of his work and have seen exhibits of his work in various cities plus single prints in many more exhibits--and held prints in my hand at the Fogg Museum...so basically I can make a claim that I know prints that are the "usual suspects" and those which are not.

That said, in my brief look at the book I saw numerous prints that were unfamiliar to me--and many more which were uncommon to see. My first impression is that QT's "Deep Throat" has it completely wrong.

It's a bit hard to contest a "hit job" by an anoynomous commentator but I'd love to know who they are--and if they have any connection to the other books.

I'll post more when I have a better look.

--Darin

[Merg Ross]

I've been meaning to get back to this thread. I did receive this book as a gift and after flipping through it I'm a little taken aback by the anonymous comments that QT posted.

I'm something of a Weston fan and have several books of his work and have seen exhibits of his work in various cities plus single prints in many more exhibits--and held prints in my hand at the Fogg Museum...so basically I can make a claim that I know prints that are the "usual suspects" and those which are not.

That said, in my brief look at the book I saw numerous prints that were unfamiliar to me--and many more which were uncommon to see. My first impression is that QT's "Deep Throat" has it completely wrong.

It's a bit hard to contest a "hit job" by an anoynomous commentator but I'd love to know who they are--and if they have any connection to the other books.

I'll post more when I have a better look.

--Darin

Darin, I have read again the post by "anonymous" and can agree with several of the points; I admit to not having seen the new book that you reference.

However, if the reproductions fall short of equaling the quality of those in the Lodima Press book, it is surely not worth the lofty sum asked. I am referring to "Life Work", with 110 superbly reproduced plates from the Hochberg-Mattis Collection.

Secondly, the essay accompanying the "Life Work" book, written by Dody Weston Thompson, is superb. She worked with Edward the last ten years of his life, and is without doubt the most knowledgeable scholar of his life and work; her essay is a necessary departure from the distorted biography written by Ben Maddow, a person who never met Edward Weston.

Where I disagree with "anonymous", concerns the comment that the CCP Collection is "not exhaustive". Such a comment suggests that there are some overlooked EW gems, not represented by the 1,800 prints in the CCP collection. I have seen the collection, and although not every print he ever made is there, the 1,800 are very representative of his life work from 1903 to 1948.

[Darin Boville]

I'm working on the computer, stitching images (i.e., lots of little spaces of dead time) s I shot a few pages from the Weston book showing images that I was either unfamiliar with or which I considered to be uncommon images. That is, the opposite of the "usual suspects" in the claim in the post above. I let you be the judge as to whether these really are uncommon or not. (I had originally shot about two dozen images but am only showing half here...)

Shot with my cell phone--you really need to see the book firsthand :)

--Darin

[Darin Boville]

More.

--Darin

[Darin Boville]

Last batch.

--Darin

[Michael Jones]

Except for the "beach houses" image that was in the recent Leaves of Grass exhbition, while they are not the "ususal suspects, I've seen them all before in various volumes. That said, you can never see them too many times.

Mike

[Merg Ross]

I'm working on the computer, stitching images (i.e., lots of little spaces of dead time) s I shot a few pages from the Weston book showing images that I was either unfamiliar with or which I considered to be uncommon images. That is, the opposite of the "usual suspects" in the claim in the post above. I let you be the judge as to whether these really are uncommon or not.

--Darin

Thanks for posting. I must admit to being familiar with all of these images, although several of them I would not characterize as being the "usual suspects".

However, the book could have merit if the printing is superb, the bar being raised with the Lodima Press book. What is your impression?

[Thom Bennett]

Merg,

You mentioned Ben Maddow's "distorted biography" of Weston. I've heard that term used before in reference to that bio but was never quite sure in what aspects it was considered distorted or inaccurate. What do you consider to be the primary distortion? It's been a number of years since I read it and have recently wanted to go back to it. Always enjoy reading your reminisces about the Weston's.

[Michael Alpert]

Merg,

You mentioned Ben Maddow's "distorted biography" of Weston. I've heard that term used before in reference to that bio but was never quite sure in what aspects it was considered distorted or inaccurate. What do you consider to be the primary distortion? It's been a number of years since I read it and have recently wanted to go back to it. Always enjoy reading your reminisces about the Weston's.

The reference is from Charis Wilson's book: Through Another Lens, My Years with Edward Weston. In her very well-written biography/autobiography Wilson wrote that she did not recognize the man she had been married to when she read Maddow's study. I take what Charis Wilson wrote at face value.

[Merg Ross]

Merg,

You mentioned Ben Maddow's "distorted biography" of Weston. I've heard that term used before in reference to that bio but was never quite sure in what aspects it was considered distorted or inaccurate. What do you consider to be the primary distortion? It's been a number of years since I read it and have recently wanted to go back to it. Always enjoy reading your reminisces about the Weston's.


The reference is from Charis Wilson's book: Through Another Lens, My Years with Edward Weston. In her very well-written biography/autobiography Wilson wrote that she did not recognize the man she had been married to when she read Maddow's study. I take what Charis Wilson wrote at face value.

Not a reference to Charis' book, although she also said as much in conversation. My considered authorities on the subject are his sons, in particular Brett. We had many conversations on the subject of the Maddow book.

Maddow was at a disadvantage, having never met the subject of his prose. Had he, perhaps less fiction would have crept into his essay. Perhaps not, as sometimes sensationalism and distortion are the intent of the author. The recent biography of Brett Weston comes to mind.

Thom, I have not read the Maddow book for decades, and have no interest in revisiting it. However, I have always been comfortable with the assessment of Edward made by those who knew him well, early on. Among them I would include Merle Armitage, Willard Van Dyke, Ansel Adams, Charis and Ira Latour, all of them having written extensively about the man they knew. Compare those writings with the Maddow book, and you have the answer.

Thanks for the kind comment.

Merg

[Michael A. Smith]

Last May, a good friend loaned us a copy of the AMMO book, 125 photographs by Edward Weston. He referenced this thread and asked our opinion of the reproductions. We finally had the time to carefully look at the AMMO book and our Lodima Press book, Edward Weston: Life Work side by side. I trust it is never too late to weigh in. I must state up front that my wife, Paula Chamlee and I are the owners of Lodima Press.

First general impression of the AMMO book is that the printing is weak. A more careful look is that reveals that a few of the plates, those with a deep enough black tone, are okay, but most are gray, lifeless, totally dead. They are the barest illustrations of the actual photographs. In most of the plates the black tones are extraordinarily weak. I have seen other poorly reproduced books of Weston’s work, but these are perhaps the poorest of all.

The middle gray tones are flat, without modulation, and in many plates the highlights are blown out—something never found in an Edward Weston print. It appears that the publisher just took the scans supplied by the Center and printed them as is, without first even proofing them and comparing them to the original prints and then making the appropriate corrections. Our guess is that the scans were made for archival purposes only and not with high-end reproduction in mind. They have enough detail in them; it is not a question of resolution, but of tonal values.

There are twelve reproductions in both books under discussion. In one or two of those twelve, our reproductions look a little bit too dark. Although in the AMMO book those are lighter, they are also weaker.

When “wet proofs” were made for our Lodima Press book, we carried the press sheets to the museums (three times, even flying to the museums to do this) where the prints were then hanging (unfortunately, the exhibition was already traveling before we got the go ahead to be the publisher), and we compared the press proofs to the originals and made notes on them and returned the sheets to the printer so they could make the appropriate corrections where necessary. To our surprise, when we compared the reproductions that seemed too dark to the original prints, they matched. Our goal when printing the book was not to do anything to “improve” on Weston’s prints, but to match them as precisely as we could. In this regard the following story is appropriate:

We know the collector who owns Edward’s own copy of Pepper #30. Edward considered it the best print he made from that negative. Eventually, Ehe gave the print to Brett. And Brett gave it to a friend whose father was a close friend of Edward and Brett and who had grown up around the Westons. The friend sold it to this collector in 1974. (Way too soon.)

When we showed the collector the book Edward Weston: Life Work, he brought down this print of Pepper #30, which we had seen previously, and placed it next to the reproduction of Pepper #30. We (me, Paula, the collector and the collector’s wife) looked very carefully at the print and at the reproduction, trying to find differences. There were a few, but they were virtually imperceptible without extremely close scrutiny, and even then, truly, there was hardly any difference between the print and the 600-line screen reproduction.

After about three minutes of this intense looking the collector’s wife said, “You know, I think I like the reproduction better.”

During the printing, we stood on press during the printing of the book, asking for further minute adjustments the few times we felt they were necessary. Unless one has seen and signed off on a wet proof of every plate in the book, not to have someone knowledgeable stand on press during the printing of a book of photographs shows contempt for the art being reproduced. I doubt very much if AMMO had anyone, or at least anyone knowledgeable, stand on press for the printing of this book.

Other: the wrong paper was used. It is too dull and no varnish to the plates was applied. This attributed to the deadness of most of the reproductions.

The AMMO book is beautifully designed. It is a pity the publisher did not care about reproduction quality.

Print selection: Unless one is determined to publish an Edward Weston book that does not reproduce any photograph previously published, something perhaps impossible to achieve today, any decent book of Weston’s photographs would reproduce some already well-known and often reproduced pictures. We disagree with the anonymous writer who said that the selection was only of well-known pictures. We found a number that we had seen reproduced only rarely and to our surprise saw two that we were unfamiliar with. (In our photography book library we own every book of Edward Weston’s photographs except perhaps some recently published ones.) The selection in the AMMO book was varied enough that, even though the reproduction are poor, we bought a copy today.

Michael A. Smith