EDWARD WESTON: LIFE WORK
Sara M. Lowe, Dody Weston Thompson,
Michael P. Mattis and Judith G. Hochber

Hardbound, 12 " x 12.5", 252 pages
110 color and black-and-white illustrations
Essays by: Sara M. Lowe, Dody Weston Thomson, Michael P. Mattis and Judith G. Hochber
2004, Lodima Press

From the Publisher:
Published on the occasion of a major traveling exhibition, Edward Weston: Life Work is a 110-photograph survey of this great American artist. Containing photographs from all phases of Weston’s long and varied career, from his first nude in 1909 to his final landscape at Point Lobos, California, in 1948, previously unpublished masterpieces are interspersed with his well-known signature images.

Over two years in the making, Edward Weston: Life Work will soon be released. Never before have Weston’s photographs been reproduced with such fidelity to his originals. For those who have not had the opportunity to see original prints by Edward Weston, but who know his photographs only through reproduction, this book will come as a revelation. In keeping with Weston’s adherence to the contact print, the photographs are reproduced actual size, and on two different paper stocks and multiple ink colors to reflect Weston’s choice of papers and finish. Printed in Belgium by Salto in a combination of 600-line screen quadtone and tri-tone plus two-color for Weston’s early platinum prints, Edward Weston: Life Work is a landmark in the publishing of fine-art photography books.

Weston began his career as a studio photographer working in the soft-focus Pictorialist mode, and ended as the quintessential sharp-focus Modernist. Edward Weston: Life Work encompasses the full historical range of his imagery, starting with his largely unheralded studio period. Weston’s three-year stay in Mexico in the mid-1920s marked his final break from the confines of the studio and his transition to sharp-focus 'straight' photography; the book contains a generous selection of his Mexican work, followed by his celebrated shell and vegetable still lifes, sculptural nudes, sand-dune abstractions, and other landscapes both early and late. Portraits of his friends, lovers, and fellow artists are included from all stages of his career.

A series of essays by Sarah M. Lowe illuminates each phase of Weston’s oeuvre. A first-hand remembrance by Dody Weston Thompson, Weston’s last assistant, gives the reader an in-depth look at Edward Weston the man, as well as insightful writing about his photographs.

Edward Weston: Life Work is drawn from the private collection of Michael P. Mattis and Judith G. Hochberg, whose joint writing in the Preface charmingly details their passion and quest for the work of this modern master.

About the Authors:
Sarah M. Lowe is an independent art historian and curator specializing in Latin American art, contemporary art, and photography. Her books include The Diary of Frida Kahlo: An Intimate Self-Portrait, Tina Modotti: Photographs, Consuelo Kanaga: An American Photographer, and the forthcoming Tina Modotti and Edward Weston: The Mexico Experience, which will accompany an exhibition at the Barbican Gallery, London, in 2004.

Dody Weston Thompson was Edward Weston’s last assistant and later his daughter-in-law after she married his son Brett. Her extensive writings include the introductions to Edward Weston: My Camera on Point Lobos and Brett Weston: A Personal Selection. Dody has been an assistant to Ansel Adams, was one of the founders of Aperture Magazine, and worked with Lou Stoumen on his acclaimed documentary films The True Story of the Civil War and The Naked Eye. An accomplished photographer in her own right, Dody has had numerous solo exhibitions including at the Monterey Museum of Art, the George Eastman House, and the Chicago Institute of Design.

Michael P. Mattis and Judith G. Hochberg have assembled a comprehensive collection of fine-art photography from its origins to the present day. Museum shows curated from their collection include In a New Light: 19th-Century Photographs from the Hochberg-Mattis Collection and For my Best Beloved Sister Mia: An Album of Photographs by Julia Margaret Cameron.