You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
This book presents 123 calling cards of artists (painters, sculptors, photographers, architects, graphic designers, illustrators etc.) from the 18th century to the present day. The facsimiled cards are slipped like bookmarks into a book by several authors on the history of the use of calling cards, the social context in which they were produced, and related historical and fictional narratives. The often unexpected graphic qualities of these personalized objects, each designed to capture an individual identity within the narrow confines of a tiny rectangle card, implicitly recount a history of taste and typographic codes in the West. But this calling card collection also lays the foundations ...
Another great pop culture document from Patrick Frey! For two and a half years, artists performing at the Bad Bonn, a popular music venue in Fribourg, Switzerland, were asked to put their songs on paper. The result is an eccentric encyclopedic diary created by the artists themselves, documenting the music they played at the fair during those years. The bands represent an array of music syles from metal, anti-folk and country to electronica, indie and hip-hop. The alphabetically organized facsimile reproductions of their handwritten lyrics, scores and doodles opens a window into the psyches of musicians and songwriters. Celebrating Bad Bonns 25th anniversary, this oversized, somewhat floppy soft-cover publication rests comfortably in the lap to allow a thorough perusal of a facet of musicians creativity not visible on stage or in recordings. Songbook is an unusual publication and source book, with broad appeal not only to the music world but the worlds of art, design and popular culture.
Around 1980 in Rome, a small cooperative around film critics Michele Mancini and Giuseppe Perrella produced a mysterious, elaborate and yet seemingly effortless 600-page book of b&w photographs, Pier Paolo Pasolini: Corpi e Luoghi (1981). In the multifaceted cultural and political environment of the era, the publication was acclaimed an indispensable tool for future Pasolini (1922-1975) research. Although long since forgotten and out of print, Corpi e Luoghi, to this day, it remains what one reviewer called the most Pasolinian book to date. With its relentless and yet playful classification of some 2,000 film stills arranged under the categories of bodies and places, Mancini and Perrella stage an ever-shifting archival space. Some of the pictures recurring under various subcategories. With a hidden reference to Walter Benjamin and a correspondingly revolutionary attitude, quotation here is understood as a form of appropriation, as a practical application of specific material.
"Glamorous impersonations of evil: In the fall of 1999 Edition Patrick Frey published 'The Nazis', which soon became a legendary cult book. It has long since been out of print and remains highly coveted to this day. While 'The Nazis' showed stills of actors playing Nazis in various Hollywood movies, Polish artist Piotr Uklanksi has now juxtaposed them with the real thing: Nazi party bigwigs, decorated 'war heroes' and war criminals. Painstakingly culled from a great many different archives, this follow-up compilation superimposes fact on fiction, the stagey, propagandistic imagery of the Third Reich on the mockup Nazi iconography of Hollywood, revealing an uncanny, even spooky, resemblance between the play-acting and real-life exponents of evil. 'Real Nazis', using the same format and production values as its predecessor, is the 'real' brother that now seems an ugly reflection of that 'glamorous' artist's book 'The Nazis'"--Publisher's website (viewed on December 7, 2017)
An impressive and intimate rendering of the heyday of motor sports: found photographs from Monaco to Palermo Everything about them is cool. The baby blue Porsche 917, the Chevy Camaro, the blue-, red- and yellow-striped overalls, the boys in low-buttoned shirts, sporting moustaches and a full head of hair, with the sunshine in their faces. Women wearing thick eyeliner and bell-bottoms, girls in crocheted bikinis at the finishing line, garlands of flowers for the winner. Motor sports in the 1960s, '70s and '80s gave rise to a whole world of imagery that arouses a certain wistfulness nowadays. Not only a nostalgia for beautiful old racing cars, but a more comprehensive yearning for the days wh...
Roswitha Hecke's photo book Liebes Leben (Love Life) about the Zurich artist-muse and prostitute, Irene, also called "Lady Shiva," was published for the first time in 1978. It became both a cult book and an international success. Reprinted many times and translated into several languages, it is finally available again. The new, revised volume put out by Edition Patrick Frey presents photos that have never before been published. It is through the director Werner Schroeter that Roswitha Hecke met Irene. Irene, a secret star of Zurich's Boheme at that time, worked as a prostitute until her tragic accidental death. For three weeks Hecke photographed her daily routine in Zurich and accompanied he...
In 'Familiar Territory' we find portrayals of farm animals together with their owners. However, instead of being situated in a stall or field, they are pictured in the midst of peoples' living quarters. The emotional connections that exist between animals and humans find multiple expressions here, and are also effectively questioned. American photographer Jon Naiman invokes the traditions of portrait and documentary photography as a way to investigate culture, habitat, domesticity, family and gender roles, as well as our relationship with animals. Although the photographs are orchestrated and carefully composed, Naiman has managed to capture moments of intimacy.
Pathé'O, originally from Burkina Faso, is an African fashion icon in every sense of the word. Known for his collections far beyond his chosen home Ivory Coast, the designer's visionary legacy has been influencing the aesthetic standards and experience of fashion on the African continent for over 30 years and has also led to a recent collaboration with the fashion house Dior. His distinct design aesthetics and cutting-edge approach to sustainability alongside a gift for combining cultural commitment with entrepreneurial creativity have inspired designers of all ages. For long it was common for politicians and showbiz celebrities in West African former French colonies to dress in a Western ma...
The first book on the New York painter's eclectic iconography of jazz musicians, boxers and friends With bright patches of acrylic paint and carefully placed found ephemera, New York-based artist Armando Alleyne's (born 1959) multimedia portraits are immediately eye-catching, drawing viewers in to inspect and appreciate the layers of meaning collaged on top of one another. Alleyne's renditions of jazz musicians, Afro-Latino singers, and his own family members and acquaintances are rife with color and contemporary iconography as well as references to the artist's own life. Series such as Shelter Blues reflect on Alleyne's experiences of homelessness, while Maria's Song pays homage to his late sister through a pantheon of religious imagery. This volume is the first book on Alleyne, highlighting a lifetime of work alongside snapshots and personal anecdotes.
Die Not hat ein Ende The Swiss Art of Rock ("Need Comes To an End-The Swiss Art of Rock") is Lurker Grand's third and most recent book project in a trilogy published by Edition Patrick Frey. Here the focus is not so much on a musical era and its protagonists as on the visualization of the subcultures. Designers, graphic designers, musicians, and photographers from across Switzerland visualize the last 50 years of local rock and pop music history through their album covers, concert posters, flyers, fanzines, comics, and photographs. Die Not hat ein Ende The Swiss Art of Rock is not just another colorful book about music, but instead an impressive historical document of an era. It is a fulsome...