A Corrosive Study

Time Passes

by Robert Adams
Thames & Hudson (April 2008)
100 pages/hardcover/32 tritone photographs/$40.00

Reviewed by Jain Lemos

Robert Adams, master of recording transforming topography, releases Time Passes this year in conjunction with his recent Paris exhibition, On the Edge. Most of the book’s 32 plates show extending seascapes conveying Adams’ meditation on what he terms transience. His endless hours watching the Northern Pacific tides, catching dancing light and rolling liquid, have produced straightforward and submersing stills.

At the first tossing of pages, many frames appear to be taken seconds apart and nearly identical. But returning and pausing—as though on a daily outing to the shore—each capture emerges as vastly unique. In one, there is a sense of drowning. In the next, a distant breaker brings promise. On another, an unexplainable yearning sets in, as though the ocean will deliver a long awaited answer. Maximizing the inadequate medium of a camera in his hands, he delivers a bystander view of the immeasurable.

Clearly the images in Time Passes are meant for museum and personal viewing in large format. Even then, matting and framing confine what we know Adams sees. And though the book is well crafted, in print form the restrictive knot is tied even tighter. Yet Adams once again proves his excellence. No matter the method provided for ingesting these impressions, their intimate impact and narrative significance about our changing landscape is engulfing.

No Style Left Behind

Mr Classic

by Jeremy Hackett, Photographs by Garda Tang
Thames & Hudson, May 2008
200 pages/hardcover/136 photographs/$40.00

Reviewed by Jain Lemos

Jeremy Hackett is Mr Classic. Having a clothing label for decades plus writing a column for the U.K.’s The Independent on Sunday are excellent platforms for influencing men’s fashion. But what decidedly earns Hackett this moniker is his talented facility for reviving the proper styles once worn by Britain’s aristocracy with modern practicality.

For his book, Mr Classic, London-based photographer Garda Tang shoots Hackett’s models with fitting technique. Every bow tie, every just-so lifted chin neatly accentuates Hackett’s vision of gentlemanly chic. The looks are respectable and refreshing, not stuffy or stagnant.

Mr Classic explains the nods and shakes over every outfit detail from shoe polish and floral prints to wearing “serious” cufflinks. Tang stages athletic, social, business, casual and seasonal occasions. He blends an original mix of old and new in his photographic coverage. A lad playing near a tire rubbish heap wears a navy blue newsboy cap, white button-down shirt and tan cuffed trousers that match both the Band-Aid on his hand and the tips of his slip-on sneakers. The shot is propped with a vintage model racing coupe in red, the color of his suspenders.

Among Tang’s black-and-white shots, a swimmer demonstrates how goggles pair nicely with belted shorts and no shirt; a pinstripe-suited businessman in a bus stop shelter wears his bowler smartly tipped while tapping on his laptop.

Tang’s flair for capturing the mood of each topic for Mr Classic is spot-on. When Hackett clarifies that a man’s pajamas are no giggling matter, Tang responds with an appealing interpretation. A yawning man with bedhead revealing a touch of his bare belly, appears perfectly fine in wrinkled PJs made of shirt linen fabric. Shown at his front door, he holds a metal basket with bottled milk and biscuits; opposite, a cat enjoys her morning meal from the window ledge. Cat-in-the-sill lace curtains crown the scene. The photo’s effect is a grin just short of a snigger.

With Mr Classic, Hackett’s amusing narrative and Tang’s spotless photographs seamlessly combine to create a rallying cry for the Sharp Dressed Man. The book eloquently hints that certain attire—such as those pilled, ankle-gathered sweatpants—will no longer do. Don’t be surprised if after undertaking this study, there is a compulsion to dust off the holiday tasseled loafers and go for a stroll. Maybe add a striped shirt for sport.

(Note: The author does not use punctuation when abbreviating Mr in the book. The publisher’s press release and other bookstore references do.)

Catwalking in the Cradle of Mankind

Natural Fashion: Tribal Decoration from Africa

by Hans Silvester
Thames & Hudson, April 2008
168 pages/hardcover/160 color photographs/$45.00

Reviewed by Jain Lemos

With photographs enchanting to behold, Natural Fashion: Tribal Decoration from Africa by Hans Silvester is a sure selection for this spring’s required viewing list. Silvester, known for his protracted study of subjects, travels to Ethiopia’s Omo Valley a dozen times over four years for this new release. He infiltrates the fantastic body painting displays of two congenial tribes, the Surma and the Mursi. While this ancient African practice is uniquely noteworthy, the book also packs a universal message.

Out of the gate, Natural Fashion provides readers with stunning visuals of tribe members sporting wearable art crafted from every handy item found in the Valley’s organically rich environment. Several spreads into the book, it becomes evident the collection is rare; publishers tout these photographs as an unprecedented series. None of the shots are random. Silvester’s direction, especially with the children, is sublime. Unforced light mixes with the colors of weeds, clay, flowers and skin creating pigment perfection. Beyond the spectacle of their intricate blending with the land are unforgettable sets of primordial eyes peering into his lens.

The Surma are whimsical masters of flair as they quickly complete their stylish transformations. The Mursi are equally skillful with their adornments but are pegged as aggressive to outsiders, cleverly stealing cameras, watches and car antennas. Both groups have become resourceful in another manner: the nomads sell every possession to the increasing masses of gaping sightseers. They even forfeit their signature clay lip and earlobe plates in exchange for posing, about five for a dollar. Riches are spent on weapons and alcohol, necessities for coping with the region’s onslaught of war, climate change and social tragedy.

When exotic destinations are discovered, too often the result is a disgraceful exploitation where natives become captive exhibitions. In Natural Fashion, Silvester shows us everything we need to see. What is more, his expert images prompt a meditation with this focus: Buy this book and stay off the tour buses.

To Skip or Not to Skip?

Living Proof

by David Alan Harvey
powerHouse Books, December 2007
112 pages/hardcover/52 photographs/$29.95

Reviewed by Jain Lemos

“Skip the pictures and go straight to the last page...read Uptown’s poem,” advises David Alan Harvey on perusing his latest book, Living Proof. Missing any of Harvey’s images is never recommended, even if he says so himself. Harvey gives us the impression that the cavern between the cryptically thunderous lyrics of a rising hip hop artist and the expert visual storytelling of a super-pro photojournalist is a gap too immense to bridge. Isn’t that unthinkable for someone as fly as Harvey?

Harvey undertakes the hip hop scene after unexpectedly meeting Boogie Down thugs Uptown and Ruckus in the Bronx. Keyed up by the images from their first meeting, he returns for more, eventually extending his intrigue into Mississippi, Senegal, Spain and Thailand. Yet sadly, even during downtimes, Harvey’s subjects-turned-friends only provide him with performances to shoot. Frames depicting intimate moments, such as Ruckus with his daughter or candid opportunities where artists are hanging on the corner watching all the girls, look too propped up.

If the poetry in Living Proof is more noteworthy than Harvey’s pictures it’s because the distressingly organic honesty of these rappers’ writing style can’t be overlooked. That’s not to say that Harvey didn’t penetrate their world better than any other outsider shooter might have. It’s just that we see what we always see: massive gold links, heavy medallions, NBA jerseys, bling grillz, heat-packing brothers, nylon do-rags, diamond-studded Rolexes, and branded warm-up suits with twisted baseball caps.

Living Proof’s bum wrong-trim-size-for-full-bleed format is heartbreaking, too. So many photographs are in the gutter with stitching scaring the middle of faces; the only explanation is that such an infuriating disrespect for photography presentation is intentional. Still, it feels as though Harvey’s publisher faded him out.

On his blog, Harvey posts selects from the project. Here, his images from Living Proof beg for pause. Once seen released from their bookbinding prison the images stop struggling, allowing Harvey’s passion to gel with Uptown’s closing credo: “With every difficulty comes ease in this pain-afflicting saga called life….”