Gregory Crewdson's photographic series capture a particularly American state of normalcy--in dissolution. The viewer, at first seduced by what appears to be an idyllic scene, soon discovers subtle off-kilter elements more akin to Film Noir than an NBC comedy. In a work from his Twilight series, yellow school buses are parked outside white wooden houses, and students stand and lounge around in seeming passivity. Something is happening--what, we don't know. The vision is familiar yet unfamiliar, seemingly benign yet threatening. Crewdson goes to great lengths in dramatizing his disturbing suburban scenes, employing elaborate lighting, cranes, props and extras, espousing a level of behind-the-scenes preparation more akin to the making of a Hollywood movie than the making of a still image. Here perhaps is one place to locate the eerie unreality and narrativity of his pictures, the creepy attention to detail so out of place, in the ordinary settings he evokes. Middle-class reality meets the other side of the normal here--by way of Sigmund Freud.

Gregory Crewdson

Arts & Photography

Stahel, Urs

Berg, Stephan

Hochleitner, Martin

Individual Artists

Hatje Cantz Publishers

Bulgarian artist Nedko Solakov has developed a distinctive body of installations and site specific works over the course of his 25-year career, which is characterized by an embrace of ephemerality, a playful humor and a touch of melancholy. This publication includes examples from the end of the 1980s to the present.

Nedko Solakov: Emotions

Bitterli, Konrad

Beil, Ralf

Reference

Hatje Cantz

The life and career of William N. Copley (1919-1996) spans an exciting (if little-known) period in American art. As a gallerist, Copley established a powerful presence for Surrealism on the West Coast, exhibiting René Magritte, Max Ernst, Yves Tanguy, Joseph Cornell and Man Ray, before deciding, in 1947, to become a painter himself. He then moved to Paris, where he developed his own unmistakable style, a style which has come to be recognized as the native link between Surrealism and Pop art. In his emphasis on bold wavy outline and occasional use of text, Copley is now also considered a forerunner of the graffiti art practiced by the likes of Keith Haring. This important monograph reproduces a broad selection of Copley's paintings, inspired by everyday American circumstances: his cowboys and pin-up girls, his erotic and pornographic fantasies and his set pieces from everyday life.

William N. Copley: Among Ourselves

Friese, Klaus Gerrit

Mitch Epstein (born 1952) is among America's finest contemporary photographers. Two of the most powerful series upon which his reputation rests are Recreation (1973-1988) and American Power (2003), sequences that attempt to make fundamental statements about the U.S. by scrutinizing how its citizens spend their leisure and how its energy industry operates. This publication examines the development of Epstein's work through the example of these two very different series. Recreation exemplifies traditional American street photography in its sometimes ironized depiction of everyday circumstances, where American Power critiques the energy industry and its interventions in nature in much bolder gestures--cooling towers and oil refineries dominate the picture frame, riding roughshod over all rules of proportion and dwarfing anything in their vicinity. Here, in 80 color images selected from these series, Epstein's development is traced, from major protagonist of the American color photography boom to leading commentator on the state of the nation.

Mitch Epstein: State of the Union

Schreier, Christoph

Parak, Giesela

Photography & Video

How can the silence in contemporary art be made visible and even audible? And what is the intention of art in its attempt? This volume aims to answer these questions. The topic of silence is treated as a medial reflection in a broad panorama of installations, performances, video, films, photos, and drawings in different artistic ways and thus made tangible. The interdisciplinary project includes works by around 50 international artists such as Marina Abramovic, Jane Benson, Joseph Beuys, John Cage, Hanne Darboven, Jonathan Monk, Nam June Paik, Timm Ulrichs, Jorinde Voigt, and others.

Sound and Silence. The Sound of Silence in Contemporary Art (German Edition)

Adolphs, Volker

Elzenheimer, Regine

Glasmeier, Michael

History & Criticism

Wienand Verlag

The book and exhibition present works from the first two decades of the twentieth century from the Kunstmuseum Bonn' s collection in dialogue with contemporary creative positions. What the works have in common across the distance of a century is their genesis in, and reflection on, a time of major social and political crisis. Back then, life had been profoundly changed by the industrial revolution; nowadays, climate change, wars, and the rising political power of right-wing ideologies are transforming the life of our communities. The presentation conceives art as a tool that lets us interrogate the world and imparts fresh intellectual impulses, and so also plays an active part in our societies. The title Menschheitsdä mmerung - Dawn of Humanity - is borrowed from the poetry anthology of the same title released by Kurt Pinthus in 1919. Florian Illies, who already wrote an afterword for the 2019 centenary edition of Menschheitsdä mmerung - the bestselling poetry anthology in the history of German literature - contributed the keynote essay in the book.

Dawn of Humanity: Art in Periods of Upheaval (German Edition)

Illies, Florian

Kreuzer, Stefanie

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Books by Berg, Stephan