Author Archives: Periodicals/Reference Librarian
People – Couples
The People – Couples folder has a whopping 222 images – right from early illustrations and etchings to contemporary photographs.
Come take a look at awkward couples, sad couples, passionate couples, pseudo couples, surreptitious couples, dramatic couples, dancing couples, frolicking couples and many other kinds of couples in between.
Page from The Compleat Lover (1972). Image source : Mary Evans Picture Library
“climbing drainpipes to darkened windows..”, taken from The Compleat Lover (1972). Image source : Mansell Collection
“Be quiet, Sir! begone, I say; Lord bless us! how you romp and tear!”. Page from The Compleat Lover (1972). Image source : Mary Evans Picture Library.
From the article “Life Goes to a Luau in Hawaii”, Life (August 1945). Photo by Eliot Elisofon
“When you pack that lunch, remember Rheingold goes along on more picnics than any other beer in New York!” says Emily Banks, Miss Rheingold 1960
“Couple with Shipping Bags” Sculpture by Duane Hansen
Cigarette ad (April 1964)
Pages from The Compleat Lover (1972). Art by Roger Coleman
Pages from The Compleat Lover (1972). Photo by Michael Bussell
Photo : Alen Macweeney American Photographer, 1985
The Lawyers. Photo by Aldo Rossi. Out (June 1996)
Out (June 1996)
People Magazine, June 16 2008. Photos by Mary Ellen Mark.
Photo by Donna Ferrato
National Geographic (June 2010)
A selection from a box of photographs by Natalie Gruppuso
A selection from a box of photographs by Natalie Gruppuso
Album
Album
February 1970-January 1971
(12 issues; missing #4 & #8)
Album was published in London from 1970 to 1971. Its editor was Bill Jay.
It was a magazine of photography’s incursions.
Every page is black and white. No ornament, austere blocks of text. The effect is like drawing a curtain, or dimming the lights in a theater, only without the direction dictated by film, leaving you free to wander.
There are no advertisements.
Its concern was the actuality of practice. Old essays followed new talents in a critical space where “art photography” was as ludicrous a term as “art painting,” and what appears easy and available as a technology is, like any artistic practice, much more fugitive and essential.
Duane Michals, Issue #7
Issue #1
from “On Being a Radical Photographer,” an interview with Blankfort, Issue #1
W. Eugene Smith, “Black Man’s Battleground,” Issue #2
from Issue #2
W. Eugene Smith, “Mailbox,” Ku Klux Klan series, Issue #2
from Press Cuttings, Issue #2
from Quotes, Issue #1
Gordon Bennett, “San Francisco,” Issue #11
from Opinions, Issue #1
Bill Brandt, “Friar’s Bay,” Issue #1
from Opinions, Issue #7
Manuel Alvarez Bravo, “Luz restrida,” Issue #9
from John Thomson’s “Illustrations of China and its People,” Issue #9
George N. Barnard, official photographer to Sherman’s Campaign, Issue #7
Harvey Himelfarb, from the Visual Dialogue Foundation portfolio, “Premonitions of a Tyranny of Culture,” Issue #10
They dressed me up like this
We’ve been on a witch hunt. Look what we found.
Our witches are real. We stake our lives on it.
‘Tis the season for torture and fear. Just kidding. It’s time for costumes and pumpkins and beer. Prost.
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In the Picture Collection under Mythology & Fairy Tale –> Witches & Wizards.
Sources:
1. Jong, Erica, “Witches,” Abradale Press, 1981
2. Ingpen, Robert and Page, Michael, “Encyclopedia of Things That Never Were,” Viking, 1987
3. Maple, Eric, “Witchcraft,” Octopus, 1973
Mannequins
Dress forms have been around for ages, with possibly the oldest one discovered in 1923 in King Tutankhamun’s tomb dating back to approximately 1350 B.C! What started as a basic and utilitarian human-like frame morphed through the ages from simple busts to elaborate European fashion dolls to the mannequins we see casually hanging out at store windows today. Not very casually actually, since they might actually be sizing you up for the powers that be.
Not surprisingly, these adjustable, modifiable human stand-ins also ended up in many works of art. And more recently, like this unwed lady who responded to the pressures of having a family by simply going out and buying herself the perfect one. And then spending 14 years documenting their life together.
Or this mannequin-dancer-robot-monster. Wow, that eye contact.
Jordan Wolfson’s piece at David Zwirner Gallery
As you go through the folder, you can see window displays and how mannequins changed shape over the years, including some old and abandoned ones from a mannequin factory. You will also find pictures of their modern utilitarian versions – crash test dummies.
One of the highlights of this folder is a 7-page vintage 1920s catalog for a French mannequin maker. Each Flapper era mannequin is shown here in beautifully lit, black and white images.
Including the ones below, the Mannequins folder has a total of 38 items.
Cover for the The “Succes” Collection catalog by Mannequins Siegel Bruxelles
Right : Model No. 51001 – Imitation Wax
Middle : Google says it means “Remember that we submit a model at home”. Left : Model No. 51005 – Resistant to all temperatures Right : Model No. 51004 – Washable and easy to maintain
Left : Model No. 51002 – Make up does not alter in light. Right : Model No. 51003 – Google thinks it means “Resistant composition and unlimited duration”
Petrole Hahn, 1931 – Gelatin Silver Print – Photo by Ellen Auerbach and Grete Stern
Avenue de Gobelins, 1925 Gold-toned albumen print – Photo by Eugene Atget
Early window displays
Oh my, look how costly the US woman has to be.
Stare, Detroit Mannequin Factory – 1999
Top : Four Faces, Detroit Mannequin Factory – 1999. Bottom : Baby Faces And Hands, Detroit Mannequin Factory -1999
From “Modern Maturity” magazine – April/May 1978
Window display 1
Window display 2
Window display 3
“I prefer my pants just so” window display 4
Window display 5
Soviet Life
Soviet Life
May 1968-May 1981 (incomplete)
In 1956 the U.S. and Soviet governments agreed to a mutual propaganda plan modeled on Life. From them we got The USSR which became Soviet Life which became Russian Life. From us they got Amerika which became America Illustrated. “Soft” propaganda for a Cold War. Gentle cultural competition. Achievement, progress, beauty, tourism. Soviet Life could celebrate the cosmonauts and the construction of a dam as though ballistics and explosives were signs of society’s liberation. One can just imagine what Amerika looked like.
Somewhat relatedly, the U.S. Information Agency, which seems to have had a hand in all this, also employed Chermayeff & Geismar (which later added & Haviv) for a traveling Russian-language exhibition that showcased American design. Featured among the designer portraits, which can be found in the Milton Glaser Archives, was none other than Milton Glaser.
Find Soviet Life bound in green in the back near the bathrooms.
Intercosmos: Orbits of Cooperation, April 1981
Perhaps the Hardest Part is Waiting, April 1981
Kutaisi, This Wonderful Town, May 1981
The Festival for Everybody, May 1981
Marx and Lincoln, May 1968
Women Take Over Men’s Jobs, May 1981
What is Kreshchatik to the Man on the Street?, July 1968
Blast Saves a City, June 1968
SVA Library Picture & Periodicals Collections 