I Am a Bullet : Scenes from an Accelerating Culture
by DEAN KUIPERS, DOUG AITKEN
Average Customer Review:
Hardcover (18 July, 2000)
list price: $35.00
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Editorial Review

The title of this mélange of journalism, cultural critique, and pop art comes directly from the mouth of the only man who has ever traveled close to the speed of sound without a vehicle. In 1960, Captain Joseph Kittinger jumped from a helium balloon almost 20 miles up, with 99 percent of the earth's atmosphere beneath him. He plummeted at 614 mph, but strangely, felt nothing. Until his senses reoriented themselves, he thought he was floating.

Right now, according to the creators of this intriguing book, acceleration is the main event. It is "the prime physical, technological and even spiritual engine of this moment." The question the book tries to answer is, How do we experience speed? To find out, the author and photographer went on-site to document 10 subcultures that particularly embody the strategy of constant movement as an effort to get outside of time. Probing essays and photo collages examine public auctions, which feed on the increasing frenzy of consumerism, and the infamously speedy Japanese youth culture, where individualistic critique is emerging for the first time and identity is up for grabs. Truckers become a rolling metaphor for America as they constantly fail to escape from time. Demolition derby drivers look for raw catharsis. And in clock-free Las Vegas, "no time is good time and good time is lucky." Then there is the pandemic of gangs on the Sioux reservations in South Dakota, an idea introduced through media bombardment. This is not necessarily easy reading (the typeface itself is often tiny), but it does offer fascinating insight into the American mythological terrain of becoming (which requires perpetual motion) and the consequences of "constantly treading water at the surface of change." --Lesley Reed ... Read more

Reviews (4)

speed freak
Dude, this book is the bomb. I saw it on my friend's coffee table, andfirst started just looking at the pictures. I especially liked the stuffabout the demolition derby, because those people are like Springermaterial, but you get the feeling that they have real lives and stuff,which is a perspective I wastotally into. When I started reading theessays, at first I didn't get that it was all interconnected, but by theend I understood that there is a lot in common between say, teenage chicksin Tokyo and gangbangers in South Dakota. Even if you're too lazy toactually read it, you'll look a lot smarter just having it around.

text at the speed of sound
It seems Aitken and Kuipers have taken the best lessons from theirassociation with "Raygun" and left behind the more Sprockets-like habits that often made that publication frustrating, if not plainunreadable. We not only know exactly what Kuipers is talking about in eachessay, but get involved enough in these disparate and exotic locales towant to make the thematic stretches that are sometimes required. The textstyle is something I found especially interesting, and be it genius oraccident, placing all text in caps accelerates the rate of comprehension inan almost imperceptible way. Given the theme of acceleration and the speedof culture, I found myself part of an experiment I quite enjoyed. The pieceabout the Lakota boys in Wanblee forsaking the warrior culture of theirancestorsfor that of TV sensibility gangland posturing is chilling andunbearably sad. Aitken's photos are exceptionally moving in this piece,especially that of a boy around 16 leaning against a tattered babyseat withan aluminum Louisville Slugger, waiting in his res grotto of chaos,diapers, and abject boredom for something to move him. I like very muchthat Kuipers refrains from editorializing about their lives, and he seemsto have an unfailing sense about when to let the subject speak for him orherself. An outstanding effort.

bullet proof
I Am A Bullet is an amazing book about the state of pop culture. Itsscope--these guys go all over the world and find the same obsession in 10totally different forms--makes the text incredibly lively, a realpage-turner. But you'll slow down to look at the images, which make theideas here all the more vivid. ... Read more

Isbn: 0609604090
Subjects:  1. Culture    2. Miscellanea    3. Pop Arts / Pop Culture    4. Popular Culture - General    5. Social Science    6. Sociology    7. Speculative Philosophy    8. Speed    9. Time    10. Social Science / Popular Culture   

Helmut Newton's SUMO
by Helmut Newton
Average Customer Review:
Hardcover (January, 2000)
list price: $5,000.00 -- our price: $4,750.00
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Editorial Review

Bringing an entirely new slant to the concept of the coffee-table book, SUMO is a suitably enormous homage to 79-year-old Helmut Newton, the master of subversive and erotic photography. "I wanted to build a monument to the most important photographer of the 20th century," comments Benedikt Taschen, the publisher behind SUMO. He delivers. Weighing over 65 pounds, measuring more than two feet long, and breaking any previous size record in book publishing, SUMO contains 480 pages of every aspect of Newton's outstanding career in photography. Each copy of the book is bound by hand and numbered and signed by the artist. In order to showcase this colossus, the book is packaged with its own stand designed by Philippe Starck.

This outsized volume contains the body of Newton's controversial yet iconographic work, documenting fashion, fetishism, and above all an overriding obsession with voyeurism that can make the viewer feel complicit or uneasy by turns. Newton himself describes SUMO as "terrifying and outrageous. I don't even look at it as a book.... I look at it as an object." --Catherine Taylor, Amazon.co.uk ... Read more

Reviews (12)

A work of art.....
This book is by far a conversation piece....I have had company that spends hours turning the pages. Even after having the book for several months, I flip through it and see photos I don't recall seeing the first time. I absolutely love this book and would highly recommend it to everyone. According to the folks at the Taschen bookstore in Beverly Hills, CA, there are fewer than 100 books left out of the 10,000 printed.

A MUST HAVE!
ANY Helmut or June fan must have this anthology!!

a Monolith
Well, as everyone else says, there's no other book like it. I had a look at a copy in an art photography store and thought it was ok, but would I pay two grand for it? Nah, I don't think so. Admittedly, the cover shot from the series 'Big Nudes' is impressive when you first see it, but these pictures were never meant to be printed at this size. Newton shoots fast and produces grainy photographs; at this size the pictures start losing clarity because of the extreme grainyness. There are also slight scratches and imperfections on some of the negatives, which at a normal size are miniscule, but here the tiniest scratch is blown up into a great white worm crawling over the page.

Don't get me wrong, Newton is one of the great lensmen of recent decades. The work displayed here is of itself, brilliant. Even so, you could save yourself a packet and buy a quality 'normal' book of his work, where the pictures can be appreciated more easily. This book's merit lies in it being an art object in it's own right. If you actually want to savour and enjoy Newton's work, give it a miss. ... Read more

Isbn: 3822863947
Subjects:  1. Fashion    2. General    3. Individual Photographer    4. Photo Techniques    5. Photoessays & Documentaries    6. Photography    7. Subjects & Themes - Erotica   

Soak Wash Rinse Spin: Tolleson Design
by Steven Tolleson
Average Customer Review:
Paperback (04 April, 2000)
list price: $45.00 -- our price: $28.35
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Reviews (17)

W O W
This compilation of tolleson design work is just amazing.the book features a lot of their best works and is very inspirational.definately worth buying, and its expensive, in fact, its really affordable, making it even more worthwhile ;)

A superb collection of inspiring design
I was a bit concerned about buying this book after reading complaints about type size, but after some debating I decided to just buy this book and decide for myself... and I'm glad that I did. Sure the type is small and a bit hard to read. But there are only significant ammounts of type on the first twenty pages. The majority of the remaining 268 pages contain mostly images. Some pages contain no type at all, other than page numbers.

This one gets 5 well deserved stars. Forget the type complaints and pick up a copy of this valuable addition to any designer's book collection.

Beauty in Imperfection
Soak Wash Rinse Spin's typesetting forces you to stop reading after too few pages.You really want to dig in but are quickly demoralized into putting it down.

Sagmeister's, "Made you look" was studied in wonder over a 10 hour session immediately after opening the package.I had never heard of him and i was quickly converted into a believer, all other scheduled items became secondary.Long lines of sans serif tiny type are the only thing that stopped this book fromhaving an impact of similar strength.

An unrelated note, within one week, the binding cracked.

One research misjudgement on my part was to assume the book was published very recently and included their newest projects (see tolleson.com)It was published in 2000 of course, some projects have glimmers of past trends.

Nothing compares to the sheer visual firepower Tolleson blasts with both barrels. There is a beautiful logic flowing with every peice and you feel drawn into the scientific precision of the studio's creative process.

A printer's eye glass would be a fun attachment to assist in reading this book, which despite it's flaws is a proud part of my collection. ... Read more

Isbn: 1568981988
Sales Rank: 148011
Subjects:  1. 20th century    2. Art    3. Art & Art Instruction    4. California    5. Collections, Catalogs, Exhibitions - General    6. Commercial - General    7. Commercial Art    8. Design    9. Design - General    10. Graphic Arts - General    11. Graphic Design    12. History    13. Methodology    14. San Francisco    15. Tolleson Design (Firm)   

Blue Note: The Album Cover Art
by Graham Marsh, Felix Cromey, Glyn Callingham
Average Customer Review:
Paperback (01 September, 1991)
list price: $24.95 -- our price: $15.72
(price subject to change: see help)
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Reviews (8)

Wonderful, but the binding is lousy
...the contents are great but after a month the binding has already come apart. The individual pages are bound together seperately, but the cover and spine has seperated from them. Otherwise, I would give this 5 stars. Great reproductions, the colors are fantastic.This makes a great coffee table book.

The Originals
It's funny how history repeats itself.As one flips through this well published book.You can see where several artist (mostly hip hop) got their album cover ideas from.The photography (artist name escapes me now) is brillient!These covers legendary and why Blue Note has always set the standard of classic album covers.If you love jazz this is a must have.

A MUST for the BLUE NOTE fan !!
Great cover photos for most of the interesting Blue Note LPs.The covers are of the original lp's but sometimes of later releases:Page 10: "Sonny Rollins / A night in the village vanguard"has later "liberty" cover Page 22: Bud Powell 2 lps down the page have later covers.

This is a little problem.

All in all a great fun for the jazz Blue Note fan!!!! ... Read more

Isbn: 0811800369
Sales Rank: 300611
Subjects:  1. Album covers    2. Blue Note (Firm)    3. Business Aspects    4. Catalogs    5. Drawing    6. General    7. Genres & Styles - Jazz    8. Graphic Arts - General    9. Jazz    10. Music    11. Performing Arts    12. Pictorial works    13. Sound recordings    14. Techniques - Drawing    15. United States   

(un) Fashion
by Tibor Kalman, Maira Kalman
Average Customer Review:
Hardcover (01 November, 2000)
list price: $30.00 -- our price: $18.90
(price subject to change: see help)
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Editorial Review

In an effort to capture great exuberance for life, authors Maira and the late Tibor Kalman put together a chaotic blend of current images from all over the world. (un)Fashion is a personal and loosely anthropological photo essay full of costumes, clothes, faces, and cultures. It is an incredibly colorful and vibrant collection of pictures that capture the expressive qualities of human dressing.

The images are organized by theme. A section on headgear ranges from men in bowler hats to hats fashioned out of newspapers and even a watermelon. The uniform chapter groups together such unlikely companions as matadors, the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders, and Australian lifeguards. While cross-cultural similarities are drawn, there does not seem to be a strict attempt to force meaning out of likeness. Rather, the book is a meandering and barely organized journey teeming with surprising sights--a Russian military dog in full gas-mask regalia, a whole-body costume made of flowers, a tin can worn through an ear as jewelry. If you're at all interested in travel and the wacky things we put on our bodies, this book is for you. --J.P. Cohen ... Read more

Reviews (3)

Costume Party!
While he was alive Tibor Kalman spent his design career showing that one could find "high art" in the everyday world. (un) Fashion is a wonderful tribute to the life of Mr. Kalman (it can be assume that the driving force behind the book is Maira who is a very talented artist in her own right).

The book has several catwalks of a wide range of people from every corner the planet. Each chapter features a traditional or (un)traditional fashion theme like body art, accessories, tribes, dressed to kill and (un)mentionables. Sometimes a featured photo can make a political statement while others show a slight touch of humor, making for entertaining page turning.

While this book isn't your typical "oversized coffee table" the production and presentation show a respect for quality. Unlike your average overpriced collection of pretty pictures this book will make you think, which is rather novel for a book of so few words. (un)Fashion is the sort of book which you will want to share with friends and family and would be a great conversation starter for any social gathering.

Deep Thinking
This is a book of photos, culled from stockbooks and everyday travels. It was completed a few years after Tibor died, but nevertheless shows his mark: deep thinking, natural + vernacular aesthetics, and a focus on subtle (un)design that would do Dieter Rams proud. Basically, the book consists of a series of (mostly full-bleed) photos with little or no captions, no page numbering, no table of contents, and only a token frontispiece -- in otherwords, stripped down to the most basic level. The photos are almost all of people: odd, creepy, weird, or out-of-place, but all interesting. The twist is that, like a lot of what Kalman did for Colors, the pictures may be viewed not only on their own, but next to and in conjuction with the photos that are adjacent to it. One image has a punk rocker wearing a belt of ammunition -- the ultimate poser. But opposite is a picture of a female gangster with a pistol and you get the feeling that she is anything but a poser. Individually they are cool photos, opposite one another they make you think. The whole book's like that. Cool cool stuff.

(un)Believable!
This book is incredible.It's like being a child again and walking around the world and seeing 500 different people, with 500 different cultures and ways of expressing ideas.It's like having the eyes of a 5 year old and asking the question over and over..."What? and Why?"This book is playful discovery. Just imagine opening a book with no introduction, no words...only photos of people around the world - what they wear, what they're doing and how they do it.But like a child you have no idea, no clues or anything.These photos begin to speak for themselves.You don't have the advantage (or disadvantage) of having a writer attach prejudices or judgements to these photos - you are left to explore your own words, prejudices and thoughts.You not only learn things about people...but you learn a lot about yourself and your pre-conceptions about other folks.

For those of you who are Tibor fans...Maira has a very touching write up about her late husband and why he initiated this book. ... Read more

Isbn: 0810945002
Subjects:  1. Anthropology - Cultural    2. Beauty & Grooming - Fashion    3. Clothing and dress    4. Costume    5. Design - General    6. Diet / Health / Fitness    7. Dress And Costume    8. Fashion    9. Photo Essays    10. Psychological aspects    11. Social Science    12. Art / Design / General