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Swedlund, Charles (Photographer); Berlanga, Paul (Contributor) & Daiter, Stephen (Editor/Publisher) : Charles Swedlund: Circa 1955: Chicago, Firefighters, Roadtrips

Stephen Daiter Gallery, Chicago, IL, 2011

First Edition / First Printing. Fine in Fine Dust Jacket. 236 pages. Retrospective Exhibition Monographs. Collection of vintage photographs. The finest gathering of the photographic art of Charles Swedlund in published form. The first and only edition. Published in a small and limited print run as a three-volume Slipcased Set only. There is no ISBN. The book set is now rare. An austerely elegant production by Adam Holtzman: Regular-sized volume format. Pristine-white softcovers with black titles on the cover, as issued. Volume I is "Chicago", 76 pages, 46 plates. Volume II is "Firefighters", 70 pages, 30 plates. Volume III is "Roadtrips", 90 pages, 36 plates. Photographs by Charles Swedlund. Essays by Keith F. Davis, Paul Berlanga, Joseph D. Jachna, and other contributors. Matching black cloth slipcase with metallic-silver titles on one side. Printed on pristine-white, thick coated stock paper in the United States to the highest standards. The production values and the reproduction quality of the images are exemplary in every respect. In thick black cloth DJ's with metallic-silver titles on the cover and spine, as issued. Published on the occasion of the landmark retrospective exhibition of the same name held at the Stephen Daiter Gallery Chicago in 2011. Presents, in an elegant collectible format, Charles Swedlund's "Circa 1955". The single most complete and illuminating overview of the photographer's body of work and achievement. "At 75 years old, Charles Swedlund, who was schooled at Chicago's fabled Institute of Design, decided to open up for public view the vast archive of black-and-white experimental photography he had kept to himself through more than fifty years of persistent shooting that ranged over countless genres, each of which he bent in new directions. He selected works 'circa 1955', dividing them into groups: Dense and intricate multiple exposures, dramatic action shots of firefighters, ice abstractions, swampscapes of Okenfenokee, cityscapes of Chicago, and urban night scenes. Swedlund shows himself to be THE quintessential photographer, dedicated to technical care and precision, harnessed to disciplined imagination, and aimed at seeing the world around us through what is revealed distinctively by the photograph" (Michael Weinstein). Swedlund's "Firefighters" sequence of real-life, unposed photographs is unsurpassed in the history of the medium: Dynamic and powerful studies in chiaroscuro that are worthy of comparison with "Old Master" artists, but with an immediacy, even urgency that is entirely their own. An absolute "must-have" title for Charles Swedlund collectors. This copy is very prominently, neatly, and beautifully signed and inscribed in black ink-pen on the title page of Volume I by Charles Swedlund. It is signed directly on the page itself, not on a tipped-in page. It is also very prominently, neatly, and beautifully signed in black ink-pen on his Contribution by Paul Berlanga. He conducted and transcribed the important Interview with the artist that appears in Volume II. This title is a late-modern art photography classic. As far as we know, this is the only such signed and inscribed copy of the Slipcased Set available online and is in especially fine condition: Clean, crisp, and bright, pristine beauties. A rare signed copy thus. 112 plates. One of the most brilliant American photographers of the 20th century. A fine collectible set. (SEE ALSO OTHER CHARLES SWEDLUND TITLES IN OUR CATALOG).

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