A Selection of Books From The Book of 101 Books: Seminal Photographic Books of the Twentieth Century

September 13 – November 3, 2001

Andrew Roth is pleased to announce the opening of an exhibition of books which are featured in our forthcoming publication The Book of 101 Books: Seminal Photographic Books of the Twentieth Century.

The Book of 101 Books is published by Andrew Roth and includes over 500 full-color plates with essays by eight renowned authors: Vince Aletti, Richard Benson, May Castleberry, Jeffrey Fraenkel, Daido Moriyama, Shelley Rice, David Levi Strauss, and Neville Wakefield.

Art historian Shelley Rice, in her illuminating 15,000-word essay “When Objects Dream,” surveys the history of twentieth-century photography through the book. Richard Benson, dean of the School of the Arts at Yale University and internationally acclaimed expert on photographic printing, follows the developments in the art of printing from the photogravure to the new digital technologies in his 5,000-word essay “Photography in Print.” May Castleberry, independent curator and editor for the Library Council at the Museum of Modern Art describes the production process for the reprinting of Steichen’s classic children’s book The First Picture Book and further discusses the challenge of exhibiting photographic books within a museum exhibition in her essay “The Presence of The Past.” Jeffrey Fraenkel, art dealer and book publisher, writes a personal account addressing the many pitfalls of book publishing in his essay “A Choice of Titles.” The contemporary Japanese photographer Daido Moriyama recounts the constructing of his seminal avant-garde publication Bye, Bye Photography, Dear (1972) in his essay “Reflections.” Neville Wakefield, art critic, theoretician and contemporary art curator analyzes Richard Prince’s radical picture book Adult Comedy Action Drama (1995) in “Stand Up Comedy and the Horizontal Sublime.” Vince Aletti, art editor for The Village Voice, and David Levi Strauss, critical writer and professor, each write insightful 300 to 500 word essays that accompany the 101 books.

Some highlights in the exhibition include: Ansel Adams’s Taos Pueblo (1930); Richard Avedon’s Observations (1959); Hans Bellmer’s La Poupée (1936); Alvin Langdon Coburn’s London (1909); William Klein’s Life Is Good & Good For You In New York (1956); Man Ray’s Facile (1935); and Bruce Weber’s O Rio de Janeiro (1986).

The exhibition travels to Andrew Roth Anderson in Los Angeles and opens on November 30, 2001.