Nude and Figure Photography

Lee Friedlander's photographs of women in their birthday suits leave me cold, but they invite comparison with Edward Weston's classic black and white nudes. Bare breasts and buttocks took on another dimension when Weston was behind the camera; his headless torsos more closely resemble the work of painters and sculptors than the passionless images of ladies decapitated by Friedlander and other contemporary photographers. Charis Wilson's memoir of posing for (and living with) Weston-- and her under-the-skin take on the thought process behind his nude studies--is fascinating.

Edward Weston's (1886-1958) large body of straightforward, elegant black-and-white photographs concentrate on natural forms--the human figure, seashells, plants and vegetables, and landscapes--eschewing romantic subjects and manipulated imagery. This volume features more than 300 duotone reproductions of Weston's work.

Born in 1902, Manuel Alvarez Bravo is Mexico's most celebrated living photographer. His far-reaching body of work includes many of the 20th century's most recognizable and iconic images. Collected here is a seductive, timeless, and entrancing sampling of the maestro's nudes, images taken in 1939 and as recently as the 1990s. Sensitively edited and sequenced by Ariadne Kimberly Huque, and with an impassioned and poetic introduction by Carlos Fuentes, this delicate, elegant volume beautifully reproduces some of Bravo's most favorite work, and provides an intimate window through which to view the career of one of the camera's true masters. Manuel Alvarez Bravo portrays and presents these women's bodies not to tell us to be content with what the world gives us, not to limit our desire, and not to ask us merely to conform, but to make us a gift of the body in person, a body here and now that does not sacrifice any of its potentialities, none of its "cans" and none of its "nevers". Here they are for anyone who knows how to look: the idea of the feminine body and its negation; the harmony of the body and the soul but also a possible disharmony; the presence of the body but also its inevitable absence; its pleasure but also its pain. --Carlos Fuentes

Masters of Photography Series. The majority of this volume's 175 tritone plates were made from rare vintage prints assembled from private collections or furnished by the artist; many have never before been published and some have not been seen or exhibited since the 1930s. This volume was published in conjunction with a 1997 exhibition at The Museum of Modern Art, New York.

Magical in detail, these photographs of the people whom Sturges cherishes most are a collaboration of trust and admiration. Phillips's compelling prose both illuminates the images and explores the unending sensuality and complexity of the bond between mother and child. 60 duotone photographs.

The latest collection by the controversial photographer Sturges charged and cleared of pornography charges by the US government. Black-and-white images capture the form of adolescent bodies and the closeness of mothers and daughters, primarily at nude beaches in France and California. An introduction and afterward comment on the process of photographing young people and the place of Sturges' work in modern photography.

A collection of seventy beautifully reproduced black-and-white photographs by an acclaimed and controversial artist offers unique and artistic nude studies exploring youth, family, and intimacy in the modern world.

This is the first comprehensive publication on American photographer Jock Sturges (b.1947) compiled by the artist himself. It is nothing less than an ode to beauty. For more than 20 years, he has been taking photographs of girls growing up, both in his native California and at a nudist resort on the Atlantic coast of France. Nudity in Sturges' work has never been a cheap or tawdry gimmick, rather it is shown as human being's natural state. His photographs are an expression of the trust he has established over the years with the girls and their families. Calmly and almost casually, Sturges observes the aging process of his models. His striking long-term studies chart barely perceptible changes in their appearance, the slow maturing of the female body. Sturges preserves transient states that will never return; graceful forms that time will eventually extinguish. A sweet melancholia pervades Sturges' images as he knows that beauty is not an everlasting state-but a brief moment in time whose essence we should cherish.

Building on his first monograph, Jock Sturges, presents us with a new body of work that strikes the same chords of beauty and evolution that we find in his earlier images, but with a more intense dramatic and metaphoric intention. His new work often has an almost theatrical effect on the viewer-seeming to emanate directly from the lives of the artist's models. The settings, the subjects, the sumptuous lighting will all be familiar to longtime admirers of Sturges' ongoing body of work. As his experience as a photographer has deepened and his relationships with his growing subjects spans decades of collaboration, both subjects and photographer have found more to say to each other. The new photographs include diptychs of clothed/nude models, pictures of true mutual trust, a s well as never-before seen color photographs! This large format book takes direct aim at Jock Sturges' long-standing vision as his large format, 8x10 view-camera always demanded the large exhibition prints that were to follow. Thanks to the brilliant combination of computer-driven advances in modern printing techniques and the old-world attention to detail and craftsmanship, this book sets a new standard for the reproduction of artworks.