American Prospects: Joel Sternfeld [ハードカバー]

The title of this review suggests that I am exaggerating, but I promise that I am not. This book of photography blew me away the first time I opened it. How had I gone for so long without hearing of Joel Sternfeld?

This book is full of large, beautifully printed color photographs of a quality I couldn't have expected. Each image is beautifully thought out and perfectly executed. The photographs are sometimes humorous, sometimes somber, and always carry a visual impact. Stephen Shore is an obvious point of reference; both photographers were working with similar materials right around the same time, both traveling the country capturing their view of America. I find Sternfeld's photographs to be placed on a somewhat grander scale, while Shore's photos suggest a more offhand manner. Both have a permanent place on my bookshelf.

I can't recommend this book highly enough, I suggest that anyone interested in serious photography buy it right away.

if you want to know where the comtemporary obsession with large format color "street" work came from, this is it. newer books, by artists like alec soth and other color documentary artists, are excellent, important books, but it must at least be noted that the true groundbreakers were working a generation ago, putting out these kinds of books before it was the accepted trend. and simply put, this work along with shore's 'uncommon places' and eggleston's 'guide', are still, in my opinion, unsurpassed.

on top of that, the size and reproduction quality of this book are mind-blowing. i can't imagine any photography fan not loving this book, or any serious student not wanting it (for a decent price, of course, which this actually is with the discount.)

I have known this work since the first edition book came out. This is a modern (2003) reprinted version with a few tweaks and added images.

The book and work is good, certainly Sternfeld's best by a long way. Some of the pictures are a little too 'interesting', with too much apparent ambulance-chasing in them for my taste. Rogue Elephant on the road/ Landslips/ Fires at the Pumpkin Farm, etc are all very entertaining, but seem too intent on finding obvious reasons to make a photograph. Obvious is not good. Much great photography has taught us that. Other quieter pictures get drowned by their noisy siblings, when they are often better and more telling moments.

For all those who put Sternfeld up there with Eggleston and Shore, it has to be clarified that the (original edition) book did not come out till 1987. The book is good, don't get me wrong, but claims he was one of the founding fathers of 'New Color' movement are beyond me - if the book was not out till the late 1980's it can't have had an ounce of the national/ international influence that Eggleston or Shore had, with their far earlier publications. Even European photographers had various color books out by then, so it would be hard to argue any paradigm shift through this work by its publication in 1987.