Walker Evans – American Photographs (1975)

The first time a photographer had a solo exhibition at the New York’s Museum of Modern Art was in 1938, and he was of course Walker Evans. He had a fascinating view of the North American society, and the exhibition printed a catalog with pictures chosen by Evans himself. Nearly 40 years later, in 1975, the book was rare and hard to find and East River Press decided to reprint it exactly as the first edition.

The images of this book changed the way documentary photography was seen and the book’s very design reconfigured the concept of photo essay into “a complex, elliptical, hugely ambitious work”. From its opening sequence of a photographer’s shop, American Photographs “declares itself not just a book about the world, but about photography… It constitutes a document of 1930s America so persuasive that John Szarkowski has remarked: ‘It is difficult to know now with certainty whether Walker Evans recorded the America of his youth, or invented it'” (Parr & Badger I:114).

The book splits in two parts, the first one dedicated to the human part of the photography of Walker Evans and the photography itself, while the second part has landscapes, architecture and other apparently empty spaces. At the end of the book there’s an essay of Lincoln Kirstein titled “Photographs of America: Walker Evans”.

East River Press, New York City, 1975. 200 x 220 mm. Softcover, 192 pages. ISBN: 0891720014.

First edition reprinted. Reprinted from the first edition (1938). Condition: Very good considering age, has some light stains on the top right of the pages, but it does not affects pictures. Pages are not loose, but the binding is affected by age so you have to be careful when opening it.