Blackout New York by Rene Burri

On November 9th, 1965, a Northeast power failure effected, New York State, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont, New Jersey and even parts of Ontario, Canada. It was said that over 25 million people were caught in the early evening blackout which lasted until the morning hours of the following day. The cause was a wrongly inserted relay switch in a power station near Niagara Falls. Rene Burri ventured out into the darkness with a handful of films to photograph and the resulting images have been published in a limited edition, Blackout New York from Moser books.

Photographing only by flashlight, candle light, or car light, Burri pointed his camera at the stranded commuters as they try to deal with the situation. Some gather in Grand Central to wait it out while others pack onto buses and cabs to find their way home. There is the suggestion of nervousness but panic isn't present.

Looking through Blackout New York, one starts to notice how small amounts of light - providing the minimum amount of information - spur the mind to fill in the bigger picture. Burri's slow black and white films, push-processed to build density in any middle-tone and highlight in the exposure results in super contrasty images that are often abstract. In one only a hand holding a lighter to the dial of a phone is recorded surrounded by vast amounts of black. The opening image features several people barely registered on the film, mostly described by flashes of white from their shirt collars. It takes us a few moments to adjust to these pictures. In a funny way this book is also partly about photography's technical limitations under these extreme conditions.

There is a fine line between underexposed images that succeed despite their flaw and those that succumb to it. In this edit there are a few images that just aren't resolved enough to merit inclusion - the aforementioned opening image for instance. When there is enough of a record made, the images glow from various light sources and people appear like apparitions out of the velvety black.

Nicely printed, Blackout New York reproduces the images as mostly double page spreads which means they run across the gutter. This design choice is distracting as the images, due to their limited detail, need fewer hurdles for us to jump over to decipher them.

At Arles last year I heard that Burri had an installation in a blackened room where the viewers were given flashlights to view these photographs. I didn't see the show but I can guess that would be an interesting way to experience these photos. In the dark with a slight sensation of unease resting on your shoulders. Your flashlight in front of you darting here and there, trying to pick up what little there is to see.

Errata Editions Limited Edition Sets

For everyone who is asking themselves "Where are the new Errata books?," they will be arriving into NY in the next week. There was a three week delay in our shipment from China due to new freighting regulations concerning Homeland Security and our shipment was held in port before we could secure clearance. We had originally expected the books to arrive for packing and delivery to our pre-order customers in the last week of December but they are just arriving to us in this next week.

Please accept our apology, as soon as they arrive to our New York studio we will be immediately shipping them out to those that have pre-ordered. Believe me, we are as excited and impatient to get them in your hands as anyone.

We appreciate your patience and know that once they arrive to your home, you won't be disappointed.

Thank you again for the support. Jeff, Valerie and Ed.

Wonderland: A Fairy Tale of the Soviet Monolith (Reprint) by Jason Eskenazi

Originally Wonderland: A Fairy Tale of the Soviet Monolith was published by De.MO but only half the print run was realized so it sold out quickly and disappeared from everyone's radar far too quickly. Jason has taken on the task of reprinting another run so that those who missed out on the first round can easily acquire a copy now through his publishing company Red Hook Editions. Ordering info can be found here. Below is my original review from July of 2008.

Jason Eskenazi's Wonderland, A Fairy Tale of the Soviet Monolith is the culmination of ten years worth of work describing aspects of contemporary life behind the Iron Curtain. Taking a page from literary fairy tales and children's stories, Wonderland is structured - less as a documentary project - and more as a metaphoric journey into the quirky landscape of the former super power as it shifts from a communist empire to a wild mix of deeply rooted traditions holding out against creeping influence of the west.

Eskenazi, a Guggenheim fellow, opens the book with an image of a woman's back as she pensively looks out an apartment window overlooking Red Square. The flowery patterns of lace curtains hang over our protagonist as a reminder of innocence or perhaps idealism as the real world outside draws her attention. The sequence quickly evolves into the traditional storyline of a fairy tale - a young child is thrust into the world to fend for herself in an almost hallucinatory state, losing her innocence in an unsheltered world.

As the photographer, Eskenazi steers her journey to reflect the changes taking place within the empire. The agrarian culture seems to be far outdated while the more modern industrial infrastructure collapses. The women change from timid peasants covered head to toe in traditional worker garb into miniskirt wearing, hyper-sexualized beings. The only structure that seems to remain strong is with the military where men exercise and wear crisp uniforms but to defend what? An ideology or an empire now split into individual states?

Lingering remnants of statues, now headless, the slaughtering of a goat, and a barber shaving a man's neck are brilliantly sequenced to remind us that the head is now coming off and the state is dissolving into the fantastic. Our protagonist experiences war, poverty, drug addiction and rape while ballerinas and princesses appear in working in factories or wandering through dingy stairwells.



The style of Eskenazi's photography follows the lead of the likes of Gilles Peress -- an accomplishment considering the plethora of bad photojournalism that is far too wrapped up in visual geometry and gymnastics at the expense of deeper content. Eskenazi has learned to make compelling photographs that have the strength of both form and content.

Although my description may make it seem like a complete downer, Wonderland isn't a harsh book on the surface a'la Nachtwey or Richards. The deeper meaning may be dark but like a children's story, it is delivered with the rhythm of adventure into a landscape of the mysterious.

Funded in part by the Joy of Giving Something Foundation, Wonderland has a handcrafted feel to the design with an uncovered book-board cover and exposed spine. My only real criticism would lie with the trim size. At only around 5X7 inches, it seems like larger work forced into too small of a package. A small criticism but noteworthy.

Stalin had once said "We were born to make fairy tales come true." When the wall finally fell it was clear that the fantasy had not been realized to what was promised. As he writes, Eskenazi explored through its remnants "searching for metaphors but realizing, too late, that I had brought my own when I first arrived. And now that it's time to leave, I sit for a few moments on the edge of the bed to assure safe travel, as the Russians do, just before I lock the door, unable to return to what perhaps never was."

Long Live the Large Family by Carl Johan de Geer

The accomplishments of Carl Johan de Geer are far and wide. Photographer, filmmaker, painter, musician, television show creator, novelist, silk screen artist, textile designer, editor of the counter-cultural mag Puss (Kiss) and general outspoken critic of political and social elites. Never heard of him? That isn't uncommon apparently. A week ago I hadn't either.

Geer's book of photographs from 1980 Med Kameran Som Tröst (The Camera as Consolation) looks like one of the undiscovered greats of Scandinavian photography. Four photos to a page - life laid out in quadrants. A new 'zine-style publication from Dashwood Books and the Boo-Hooray Gallery called Long Live the Large Family gives a sense of his extended family from the mid-60s and the early 70s with a similar flavor.

Geer was born into one of Sweden's most powerful families but in the late-50s he started to work against his privilege within the subculture of Sweden's underground art community. His bohemian friends in Stockholm became his camera's subject as they rallied against the status quo with political critiques and sexual openness.

His "style" is that of a quick-handed snapshot. I wouldn't go as far as saying these are great photos individually but together they weave a tone as free and pleasurable as the idea of youth itself. This is not the bitter tears of Nan Goldin twenty years before with the needle and the damage done but a Leftist romp embracing creativity and exuberance among friends. It all has the spirit of change about to happen instead of the capitulation of self medication.

Long Live the Family is a 40 page, staple bound 'zine printed on heavy paper. Its printing isn't perfect but that would be missing the point. It remains as immediate and non-conformist as the subject requires. The reproductions were made from four image panels which make up photo collages he created for a 1979 exhibition at the MoMA in Stockholm. Long Live the Large Family was published in an edition of 250 copies.

For those of you in NYC, check out the exhibition at Boo-Hooray c/o Steven Kasher Gallery at 521 West 23rd street between 10th and 11th avenues. There will be a closing party this Saturday from 6-8pm. Go and check out Carl Johan's books on display, a small archive from Puss magazine, material from the Galleri Karlsson, and the great political silk screen posters that line the walls. Beer and sandwiches have been mentioned.

Photobook Exchange Sale

For a limited time all books on the 5B4 Photobook Exchange are now being offered at 20% off. This discount applies for purchase only. Please contact me at jeffladd99(at)hotmail(dot)com first to make sure the books you are interested in are still available.

Maps by Nicholas Calcott

The 12th Press is a Paris-based publisher which is focusing on small edition photobooks and 'zines. Recently I picked up a copy of their newest publication Maps from Nicholas Calcott, the owner of 12th Press.

Calcott is the author of Maps but his name doesn't appear in or on the book at all - call him an archivist hidden well from view. Maps consists of 10 aerial photographs made over Poland and Eastern Germany by the Luftwaffe just before World War II.

Like satellite surveillance images or those from moon exploration, these photos become abstractions which with the overlying grid and imposition of city names, becomes a fascinating mix of image, text and line.

Farmlands - I assume (or forests maybe) - from this vantage point, are described as varying shades of grey butted against one another like planks of wood. Each photo must represent hundreds of miles worth of area and an interesting aspect for me is seeing how man effects the landscape. In some, chaos reigns from this god's eye view, while in others, man somehow managed to create a beautiful tapestry.

Introducing the information (at the end) that these images were shot by the Luftwaffe obviously taints how we look at these images and the thoughts that follow. German planes effectively bombed many cities in Poland into submission in September 1939. Bombing sorties and the lay of the land were determined by these same maps. Calcott gathered this material from the German Federal Archives.

Maps is handmade with rich inkjet printed 12" square plates on very heavy paper. It is screwpost bound and issued in an edition of 100. More info can be found at the 12th Press website.

Fallen Books by Melissa Dubbin and Aaron S. Davidson

A few years ago I was in Mexico enjoying a great jalapeno-induced mindfuck when I awoke to my bed rocking violently back and forth for a couple seconds. I wasn't sure I hadn't dreamt it until I saw through the darkness of the room the ceiling light slowing from a wide sway. In the morning I asked my wife if she felt the quake since, at the time, her gentle snore hadn't skipped a breath. She said anything she could sleep through wasn't a "real" earthquake even if the earth done quaketh. She's from Mexico City. For her, anything under 6 point 5 is either your imagination or gas.

For those living in areas with heavy seismic activity a common experience might be reshelving books that have toppled from bookcases. A new artist book from Aaron S. Davidson and Melissa Dubbin called Fallen Books explores images taken in libraries after earthquakes have done their worst to the Dewey Decimal System.

Davidson and Dubbin have organized their archive according to a modified Mercalli Scale, a graphic alternative to the Richter Scale that quantifies how strongly an earthquake effects the surface of the earth. Its color code indicates the intensity of the quake as it ripples out from the epicenter. Each photo is accompanied by basic information of date, place and library name. The back of each page is printed with the color as each episode corresponds to the Mercalli Scale.

In their statement, Davidson and Dubbin start by saying that "Books are earthquake proof." A seemingly confusing sentence that leaves me uncertain about what they mean. Many books are damaged to the point of being unusable - spines broken and book blocks wrenched from their cover-boards after great falls. They are hardly "earthquake proof," but I won't dwell on that.

What I will dwell upon is the way the artists chose to reproduce the photographs in what would otherwise be a fascinating book. The images, culled from various sources, are snapshots. They were made a straight documentation of the damage. Bookcases listing heavily off center and piles of books flowing into the aisles described with the passionless eye of an insurance agent. That to me is interesting but the oversized line screen and dot patterns in the reproductions reduce the quality too much for my tastes. Certainly this was a conscious choice and not simply a technical factor.

Fallen Books was published in an edition of 500 copies by Onestar Press. For those who know the publisher, they have put out mostly print-on-demand style books which conform in size and general quality but cover a large artistic range. Interestingly this title (and the recent book from Monica Haller, Riley's Story) departs with an inventive design by Francesca Grassi. Bound with metal screwposts and using uncoated paper stock, my disappointment with the image quality is abated somewhat by the form.

I want to like Fallen Books partly because of the subject but also because it allows a freak like me to take a perverse, vicarious pleasure in thinking of the horror I'd face of finding my own library in piles on the floor. It works on both counts to a point, but the faults leave this hardly earth-shattering.

Nothing But Home by Sebastien Girard

In addition to Alec Soth's Allowing Flowers, the second book about home I'd like to mention is the Toulouse-based photographer Sebastien Girard's new Nothing But Home. Self-published in November of 2009, this made my best of the year list and was one of the only books that I brought home from Paris Photo.

Nothing But Home opens with wall-paper patterned endpages and the quote: "The simplest way is to take up everything again from the beginning, lie down on the grass, and start over, as if one knew nothing." What follows is an almost clinical examination of small details made while Girard's home was being renovated. His style is at times cool and detached and very claustrophobic. He describes with the eye of a building inspector, examining each imperfection which will need attending to during the construction; a paint drip on old faded wallpaper, dangerous bent nails sticking out of a wall joist, loose and wild wiring sprouting from a light socket.

Girard allows no breathing room in these photos. Perhaps metaphor for the extreme personal attention one gives to rebuilding of home, he keeps his framing tight. The artificial lighting gives the perception that all of the handy work is happening at night - a clandestine operation of transformation.

He provides no "before and after" photographs - we don't know the lay of the land at all. The closest to such an establishing shot is a photo of a stove top with rusty burners upon which sits a photo of a man's den complete with leather bound books, a brandy bottle and a roaring fireplace. If that photo represents the desired end-point then we have a very long journey clouded in spackle dust ahead.

Nothing But Home has the feel of many wonderful spare books coming from Amsterdam. Clean in design , it was bound in Holland but finely printed in Girard's hometown of Toulouse. It is in a first edition of 500 and also comes in a special edition of 100 copies with a print.

Allowing Flowers by Alec Soth

With the economic crisis and the toll on the housing market we saw and heard hundreds of stories about families facing foreclosure, eviction and/or homelessness. Photographers tried to tell many of those stories through their pictures - to put the human face to the catchphrase of "main street." A noble thing to do, but those stories do little to put people back in their houses or help with the difficultly of such a rapid change to people's lives. Finding a way to give back to your community through your photography is something few have been able to achieve, but Alec Soth has found one.

Alec has teamed up with a Minnesota-based non-profit housing developer called CommonBond Communities with the goal of providing 4000 affordable apartments and townhouses to needy residents of the Upper Midwest. Alec photographed some of the residents of the CommonBond homes and produced a beautiful book called Allowing Flowers that is given away as a gift to people who donate significant sums to the effort.

Soth uses flowers as a motif as they appear in one form or another in each photograph. The metaphor is obvious but appropriate. These homes are grounds to grow and brighten lives.

The few portraits that are taken where we can see some of the interior spaces also seem to be describing lives in transition - they start to ask when a "house" becomes a "home." In one photograph a man at the far left edge watches his sleeping child laying on the floor, in the background, framed photos rest on the floor instead of hanging on the wall. In another, a woman sits at the table in her dining room which is so pristine and tidy, the lack of signs of wear is almost a little sad.

Other photos feature portraits made outside in the communities - a family lays on a perfect patch of green grass in one where Alec is channeling the best qualities of Nicholas Nixon. In another, a woman partly obscured by a tree walks a pure white cat.

I feel odd "reviewing" this book when the real accomplishment is in the funds it will raise for this housing project. The book is available to those who donate $5000.00 to CommonBond (a $25,000 donation gets you a book and a print). Each copy is unique due to the screen printed cover boards and the interior printing is finely done by Trifolio in Verona. The ultra-clean design is by Catherine Mills.

Most of us probably won't have the money to put towards this fine effort. At least not enough to get the book as a gift, but for the few that might - it's not about the book, it's about a home.

Sanatorium by Rob Hornstra & Arnold van Bruggen

Due to my general laziness after the holidays I see that Andrew Phelps, the fine photographer and blogger of the booksite Buffet, has beaten me to the punch by mentioning Rob Hornstra and Arnold van Bruggen's newest publication Sanatorium.

Hornstra's book 101 Billionaires was one of my favorites of the year from 2008 so I was excited to see his endeavors with the Sochi Project were paying off and he had published this new title with help from donors.

Sanatorium is offered only to people who donate to help fund his version of slow journalism documenting the changes taking place to Sochi, a town in Russia, which is preparing for the arrival of the 2014 Olympics. Working alongside the writer Arnold van Bruggen, Hornstra plans to photograph in the area over the next five years, and along the way, publish magazine articles and books to get the multitude of stories out. Sanatorium is the first.

In 1919, Lenin decreed that localities with curative properties should be property of the people and used for curative purposes. Accordingly, many sanatoriums sprung up along Sochi's 90 miles of coastline.

Hornstra's description is clean, large format portraits and interiors lit with flash. The environment seems filled with out dated machinery that looks as if it would do more harm than good. In one, a boy sits in a bathtub which is lined with tubes and spouts that look more for torture than healing. In others, the curative machinery Hornstra photographs look like left over props from science fiction films with their arm-like protrusions and incomprehensible purpose.

The metaphor of wish fulfillment is in the air. Wish fulfillment not just for the healing powers of the machinery, mud baths or mineral waters in the sanatorium pictured but also in the face lift that Sochi is getting for the 2014 Olympics. What will be the outcome of the world's eyes falling on Sochi and the years after it is all over.

Book-wise, Sanatorium is short (21 photos over 42 pages) but its sexy design and production values deserve attention. Designed by Kummer & Herman out of Utrecht, they employed an interesting double stitch binding that achieves a squared off spine and a division of text from the photographs which were printed on different paper stocks from one another. Sanatorium was printed in 350 copies.

To donate to Hornstra and van Bruggen's check their website here.

Errata Editions On-Press: Day Four

The last of this set of Books on Books to be printed is Yutaka Takanashi's Toshi-e. Takanashi was one of the founders of the avant-garde magazine Provoke and of all of the Provoke era publications, Toshi-e is most impressive not only due to the photography but also because of its elegant presentation. Takanashi worked with the designer Kohei Sugiura. In fact, Takanashi entrusted Sugiura with the design, edit and decision to include the second "notebook" booklet of Takanashi's Tokyo-jin series. Most people know Toshi-e as "that large Japanese book with the shiny metal disk on the cover," well now you'll see that it's a bit more complicated than that.

The first order of business after learning Mr. Takanashi was open to the idea of featuring Toshi-e was to put together a rough layout for him to see how the book would work in our format. This meant I needed to quickly find a copy to photograph since this isn't a book that many people would comfortably lend out - it usually goes for anywhere from 4000-7000 dollars in the used book world. I knew John Gossage in DC had a one since that is where I first saw it last year. Thankfully he agreed that I could come photograph the book. It was a make-shift set up but with his help I got the results needed for a layout to send to Mr. Takanashi. I sent it off to Yoko Sawada (who was acting on my behalf since Mr. Takanashi doesn't speak English and my Japanese is a little rusty) and I held my breath for about five days. Finally I received an email saying Yoko had printed out the entire PDF document and shown it to Mr. Takanashi in person. Turned out, he was extremely pleased with how it all looked and gave his final approval.

With every book we do, Robert Hennessey figures out how best to approach the scanning or photographing of each book. As I have mentioned before, each book presents its own possible problems due to the type of printing the original book employed. Books printed in gravure pose fewer possible problems due to that process not having a set, linear dot pattern. If you look at gravure under a loupe you'll see it is much more like film grain than straight lines of dots. This means that when you rephotograph a gravure book and create a line screen over that image to print offset, there is no chance of a moiré pattern appearing.

The two books in Toshi-e were printed in gravure but on different paper stocks. For Toshi-e, Sugiura used a beautiful thick stock while for the Notes: Tokyo-jin booklet, he used a cheap newsprint paper. Robert and I spoke at length about how to reproduce the Notes: Tokyo-jin booklet since the images lacked the tonal range that the larger Toshi-e book achieved, plus, the newsprint paper had a yellowish tone. I thought we'd have to print the booklet in four color as opposed to duotone to match the paper tone but Robert suggested we print in duotone but add a second varnish layer. That second varnish would create the paper tone while we'd be able to control the exact print quality without the chance of color shifts etc.



In order to closely match the newsprint paper tone with the second varnish layer I went to a paint store and picked up dozens of paint chip sample cards within the range of tan to yellow. Finding a close match, I then sent the chip off to C+C Offset along with a few of the files and a test forme and told them to match the sample as closely as possible. A couple weeks later the sample arrived and all looked great.

The first sheets off the press looked good. Since we had done machine proofs a few months ago, C+C was able to quickly get to good starting points with all of the books this time. Although things are going smoothly, this book is 176 pages long (11 signatures of 16 pages) which means I'm in for 22 press checks. We'll be printing into tomorrow morning and then the new dustjackets for my fifth and final day.

Portfolio: 40 Photos 1941/1946 by Robert Frank

Before arriving to New York, Robert Frank prepared a portfolio of 40 photographs in order to introduce his work to magazine editors. Upon close inspection, Frank's work from the time treads a fine line between the older school pictorialists with Aldolf Herz at its center and the New Vision advocates which included Frank's teacher Gotthard Schuh. The New Vision shows through with his experimenting with angles and pairing images sans text or caption while the pictorialist in him finds an attraction to beautiful vistas and architecture as well as the rural farm life outside of Zurich.

Opening to the first page of Frank's Portfolio just published by Steidl, we are faced with an open phone book, brightly lit and lying on a field of black. I can't help but to think this is Frank's sly nod to the difficulty he may face upon breaking into the field of commercial photography. An open phone book, full of names, it is as if Frank is saying 'find me, pick me' among thousands of competitors.

It is also an image of weight as the book seems to be surrendering under its own heaviness. This is followed by two images which are weightless - the first of a snow scene and the facing page, a ray of sunlight described from a vantage point where we feel as if we are hovering over a small mountain village.

The 'weightless' and the 'grounded' are two opposing themes that Frank repeatedly uses to move us through this sequence. Three radio transistors in a product shot float into the sky while a music conductor, his band and a church steeple succumb to gravity on the facing page. Even in this image Frank shifts focus to the sky and beyond - the weightless. When he photographs rural life, the farmers heft whole pigs into the air and another carries a huge bale of freshly cut grain which seems featherlight but for the woman trailing behind with hands ready to assist.

Considering this work was made while fascism was on the move through Europe, external politics is felt through metaphor. A painted portrait of men in uniform among a display of pots and pans for sale faces a brightly polished cog from a machine - its teeth sharp and precise. In another pairing, demonstrators waving flags in the streets of Zurich face a street sign covered with snow and frost, a Swiss flag blows in the background. in yet another of a crowd of spectators face the illuminated march of a piece of machinery - its illusory shadow filling in the ranks. These pairings feel under the influence of Jakob Tuggener, whose work Frank certainly knew. Like Tuggener, Frank tackles the task of seemingly incongruous subject matter and finds a harmony through edit and assembly.

Again and again throughout this portfolio, Frank is not just trying to show his prowess in making images but in pairing them. They define conflicts in life. One boy struggles to climb a rope while a ski jumper is frozen in flight. Fisherman bask in sunlight while two pedestrians are caught in blinding snowfall.

Like the telephone book of self-reference at the beginning, Frank finishes his sequence with a climber reaching the summit of a mountain. He is connected by safety-line to the person making the photograph. The climber looks a little like a young Robert Frank, and if one suspends disbelief for a moment, the bright line of rope caught in the sunlight, leads straight down to a dangling camera lens - tying the young Robert to the medium for which he seemed chosen.

Errata Editions On-Press: Day Three

I got a record three hours rest while they clean the rollers of the Heidelberg before starting on the Koen Wessing book Chili September 1973. For those that do not know the original book, this is a small body of work that Wessing, a Dutch photojournalist, made over ten days just after Pinochet overthrew Allende by a military coup in Chile on September 11, 1973. It was published just a few months later in Amsterdam.

The book is short and was cheaply produced with rough printing on flimsy newsprint type paper. To reproduce the book in my study I had a hard time finding a copy to borrow and wound up using Koen's last personal copy which he generously loaned.

It is a book that gets easily damaged so I packed it carefully and protected it while matching the prints on press. Last year I had the experience of one of the pressmen grabbing my copy of Sophie Ristelhueber's Fait out of my hands and sweeping its pages like an issue of People magazine so I have been extra cautious on how the books are handled by the pressmen this time. It is embarrassing to freak out because most sane people don't regard books as delicate objects. They are things that are used, read and handled. So what if pages get torn or folded? How do you explain that what they have in their hands sometimes is as valuable as a used car? At one point one of the pressmen grabbed the copy of Chili and I found myself uncontrollably shouting the word 'careful' about 6 times within a half a second like I had Tourette's Syndrome. I sounded like a turkey getting a colonoscopy.

When I have seen spreads from this book reproduced before like in Martin and Gerry's Photobook: A History I noticed that the plates always look more rich than the original. As I mentioned before, this was done with a single pass of black ink on cheap quality paper so my concern was in keeping the tenor of the original and not shifting too much the quality in my book. It is a difficult balance between matching and what might, to those unfamiliar with the original, look to be poor printing. The strategy Robert Hennessey and I came up with after seeing our proofs was to not overdo the black densities - to let the sense of the paper surface show through as a texture. The results were a true representation of the object.

Since the book is short in length the pressmen fired up a different six color press to start printing the last signatures of each book which require color. For the black and white books we have done, we print them in duotone but the last signature or two are always in color so that the bibliography and 'making of' information can feature color book jackets or illustrations when necessary. With two presses now running, the checks are turning out to be staggered so that I am called to check more often. Now the time between is only 20-30 minutes which means I have been just hanging out in the press room which is pushing me to the limits.

In the area with the Heidelbergs, C+C has installed thin pipes in the ceiling which every 15 minutes or so shoot an extremely fine mist of water into the air to keep the dust levels down. I've taken to standing under them instead of showering.

The plates for the Takanashi book are stacked and waiting their turn for tomorrow...



If you'd like to get a real sense of what press checking my books was like this time, you can do the following:

1. Get into bed and set your alarm to wake you in one hour and fifteen minutes from the time you laid down. Important! Don't get undressed or take off your shoes.

2. When alarm sounds, jump out of bed in a daze and stagger around for a few seconds until you recognize where you are.

3. Walk out of your house and head to the nearest deli. My trips to the press room from my guest house would take about 4 minutes of walking time.

4. Once you are in the deli, go to the refrigerator and pick up a carton of milk.

5. Scrutinize the milk carton for any flaws. No scratches, dents nor smudges. Check the print densities and don't forget - clean registration!!

6. When you can't find the perfect carton, ask to see more from the stockroom or just hang around the checkout counter for about 20 minutes looking for loose change that has fallen into the boxes of candy.

7. Pay for the milk. Leave the change you've found in the 'give a penny/take a penny' you cheap bastard.

8. Walk back home and get into bed.

9. Set your alarm for an hour later.

Repeat steps 1-9 for 5 days straight and you'll get the idea.

Sleep deprivation is said to be the worst form of torture. I haven't ever been tortured in the physical sense - no lashings, no stress positions, No waterboarding, no more listening to 24 hour recordings of babies screaming like Springa of SS Decontrol. C+C is no Guantanamo Bay but this can really suck once the fatigue sets in. You lie down for a cat nap - 45 minutes tops - before you're jolted awake mid-dream to the "deedle-leedle-leet" of the press check phone. I have started noticing some abnormal behavior.

* Running to a 4am press check, I got onto the elevator on the 5th floor of my guest house building, punched the 5th floor button several times and stood wondering why the doors weren't closing. It took almost a full minute to figure that one out.

* I accidentally kicked my tea spoon under the bed. Instead of simply retrieving it I am now stirring my instant coffee and ginger tea with the end of my toothbrush.

* I take noticeable pleasure in looking in the tea pot, watching the water, and trying to guess how long it will take before it gets to a full boil. (About two minutes).

* Choosing when to wear one of my plain grey t-shirts and when to wear my plain black t-shirts (all from Uniqlo) has become a major thought expenditure.

* Trying to coordinate which "make ready sheets" I want the paper loading pressman to use in order to get cool double-printed sheets. Not really abnormal behavior for me but to the Chinese pressman this is the oddest request they have ever gotten.

* I haven't shaven with a razor in about three years but I get the idea to do so now with a shitty plastic disposable and no proper shaving cream. Now it feels like there is a swarm of fire ants having an orgy on my chin.

* After three days of press checks I'm starting to fuckin' hate books.

Best Books of 2009

2009 is drawing to a close and it was a good year for photography and art books. I had a very hard time weeding books out for this list. I see now it is a really odd mix that reflects my ever-shifting tastes.

Best Books of 2009

1. Lisboa: cidade triste e alegre by Victor Palla and Costa Martins. I applaud this incredible reprint of the classic Palla and Martins book as the production is as impressive as the photographs. An extremely complicated book to do a facsimile and they nailed it right down to the printing, paper and binding. Plus it is very affordable considering how expensive it was to produce each copy. Do not hesitate. These will not last long.

2. Robert Frank: Looking In. Priceless. 14 years in the making. And I thought I was tired of The Americans. Get the hardcover version with all the good additional material.

3. Protest Photographs by Chauncey Hare. Great photographs, fine Steidl printing.

4. John Baldessari: Pure Beauty. This catalog from LACMA has remained my bedside reading for the past two months. Great retrospective, great book.

5. Studien nach der Natur by Jurgen Bergbauer. The charm of this certainly should have worn off by now. It hasn't.

6. Bettie Kline by Richard Prince. Love Kline. Love Bettie Page. Love Prince for putting them together.

7. Greater Atlanta by Mark Steinmetz. The third in his Southern trilogy. I wish his photos would just keep coming.

8. Novemberrejse by Krass Clement. A quiet master of beautiful photographic sequences.

9. Wald by Gerhard Richter. The best of the twelve Richter books published this year.

10. In this Dark Wood by Elisabeth Tonnard. One of my favorite discoveries of the year. I need to get her other books now.



And since I had such a difficult time choosing, here are ten runners up that should be included above...

11. Landmasses and Railways by Bertrand Fleuret

12. Nothing But Home by Sebastien Girard.

13. Overpainted Photographs by Gerhard Richter

14. Not Niigata by Andrew Phelps

15. School by Raimond Wouda

16. Nationalgalerie by Thomas Demand

17. Las Vegas Studio: Images from the Archive of Robert Venturi and Denise Brown

18. Gröna Lund by Anders Petersen

19. New Topographics by Britt Salvesen

20. Ruhrgebiet by Ulrich Mack