Guy Bourdin, who died in 1991, was a legend in the world of fashion photography. He was the most radical and audacious photographer of his generation but his reputation has been surrounded in secrecy - he rarely allowed his photographs to appear outside the pages of French Vogue. No book of his work has previously been published. His estate was frozen by the courts until 1997, after which his son, Samuel, gained control of his work as a result of which this long-awaited book can be published. Bourdin was originally a ...
Read More
Guy Bourdin, who died in 1991, was a legend in the world of fashion photography. He was the most radical and audacious photographer of his generation but his reputation has been surrounded in secrecy - he rarely allowed his photographs to appear outside the pages of French Vogue. No book of his work has previously been published. His estate was frozen by the courts until 1997, after which his son, Samuel, gained control of his work as a result of which this long-awaited book can be published. Bourdin was originally a painter and a friend of Man Ray. His fashion photographs began to incorporate his surrealist influences. Fashion photography became an arena for his personal obsessions. The results are as shocking and astonishing as any commercial photograph ever published. They were executed meticulously. Despite his intense eroticism, subversion and, as Cecil Beaton described, 'his grotesque little gamines', Beaton referred to him in 1975 as 'unquestionably the most interesting fashion photographer in Paris today'. His work was said to have represented 'the look of an era - glamorous, hard-edged, cleverly spiced with vulgarity...rich with implied narratives and strong erotic undercurrents'.
Read Less
Add this copy of Exhibit a: Guy Bourdin to cart. $122.13, new condition, Sold by GridFreed rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from North Las Vegas, NV, UNITED STATES, published 2001 by Vintage Uk.
Add this copy of Exhibit a: Guy Bourdin to cart. $137.70, like new condition, Sold by Paul Brown Books rated 2.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Ramsgate, UNITED KINGDOM, published 2001 by -Jonathan Cape (2001)-.
Choose your shipping method in Checkout. Costs may vary based on destination.
Seller's Description:
First edition, 2001. Unpaginated 208 pages. Illustrated in colour throughout. Cloth. Fine in dustjacket. Guy Bourdin's surreal and erotic imagery filled pages of international magazines throughout the 1970s. Within the medium of fashion photography, he gave shape to a dark and intriguing vision that exerted lasting influence on the international style scene and altered the contemporary aesthetic. Bourdin rarely allowed his work to appear outside the pages of the magazines, and there has never been a book published devoted to his remarkable legacy. He remained an enigma, shunning publicity and becoming reclusive. After his death the French government seized all his work for non-payment of taxes and it was thought a book would be impossible. However, published under the guidance of Bourdin's son, Samuel Bourdin (who put his affairs in order and enabled publication) and creative director Fernando Delgado, Exhibit A presents for the first time a comprehensive look at the range and depth of Bourdin's photographic work, from the mid-1950s until his death in 1991. The images herein represent the highlights of his career-including his work for Vogue Paris and his revolutionary advertising campaign for Charles Jourdan shoes. Bourdin is featured and canonized in every history of commercial photography for a style described by one historian as the 'look of an era, glamorous, hard-edged with implied narratives and strong, erotic undercurrents'. Vogue became a playground for him, the magazine's double-page spread allowing him to indulge his fantasies. He constructed narratives and small scenarios; inventive, shocking and erotic they only served to nurture his own macabre and dangerous persona. A biographical essay by Michel Guerrin, photography critic for Le Monde, will provide a long-overdue look at Bourdin's career. Writer Luc Sante (author of American Photography 1890-1965 and New York Noir) contributes a foreword. Exhibit A: Guy Bourdin is a landmark volume; these compelling images are as provocative today as they were over two decades ago, and they have left an indisputable mark upon contemporary photography and the visual arts.
