BILL JACOBSON: 1989-1997

Santa Fe, NM: Twin Palms Publishing, 1998. First Edition. First Printing.. Hardcover. Fine/Fine Dust Jacket.. Santa Fe, NM: Twin Palms Publishing, 1998. Hardcover. Fine/Fine. First Edition/First Printing. Unpaginated. Artist Book. The artist/photographer's breakthrough debut collection. One of the most brilliant art photography books of the 20th century. Limited Edition of 3000 copies. An austerely elegant production by Bill Jacobson and Jack Woody: Oversize-volume format. Pale gray cloth boards with black titles on cover and spine, as issued. Photographs by Bill Jacobson. Short story, "Lost Profile", by Klauss Kertess, the brilliant art critic and historian. Printed on pristine-white, thick coated stock paper by EBS in Verona, Italy to the highest standards. In white pictorial DJ, as issued. Presents "Bill Jacobson: 1989-1997". The artist/photographer's dramatic sequence of images that test the boundaries of the portrait by a singular blurring/effacing technique applied to all of the photographs. The images appear to be eerie at first, but as one moves progressively through the complete series (which are grouped into three aptly titled suites, "Interim Portrait", "Song of Sentient Beings", and "Thought Series"), one cannot help but be deeply moved by the cumulative and overwhelming power of Bill Jacobson's achievement. Jacobson has accomplished nothing less than a re-imagination of every human being as a presence who is also an absence: We are and we are not at the same time. As Ingmar Bergman once said of "Persona", perhaps the greatest film of the 20th century, it is not so much a question of being or nothing ("to be or not to be"). Rather, it is a question of being-as-nothing. Jacobson has explicitly said that the book is one of loss and remembrance, especially of friends and lovers, that is, nothing-ness. The images are deepened rather than effaced by the unusual blurring technique that the photographer has used. "I started taking photographs as a teen-ager, nearly twenty-five years ago. Since then my work has been an ongoing meditation around desire, loss, and the role of photography as a vehicle for remembrance. My pictures often function as a metaphor for the way the mind works: Simultaneously collecting images while letting others go, fading in the way memories fade, and alluding to the fact that, historically, photographs have faded as well" (Bill Jacobson). An absolute "must-have" title for Bill Jacobson collectors. This copy is very prominently, neatly, and beautifully signed and inscribed in black ink-pen on the title page by the artist/photographer: "For Luc Sante, Bill Jacobson". It is signed directly on the page itself, not on a tipped-in page. The recipient, who is named, is one of the most brilliant writer/critics of our time. Among other subjects, Luc Sante has written brilliantly on photography. This title is a great art photography book. As far as we know, this is the only such signed and inscribed copy of the Limited Edition available online and is in especially fine condition: Clean, crisp, and bright. A rare signed copy thus. 52 tritone plates. One of the most brilliant American artist/photographers of our time. A fine copy. (SEE ALSO OTHER BILL JACOBSON TITLES IN OUR CATALOG). ISBN 0944092497.