“Strange Genius: Journal of Contemporary Photography, Volume V” -- ULTRA-RARE MUSEUM EDITION with SIGNED PRINTS

Photography by Various Artists

Published by 21st Editions, South Dennis, Massachusetts, 2001

RARE LIMITED EDITION of 55 issued / SIGNED by the Artists

Offered here in AS NEW condition is “Strange Genius,” the fifth volume in 21st Edition's Journal of Contemporary Photography series. This is the very RARE and highly collectible MUSEUM EDITION, containing the handmade book with a separate portfolio of fourteen individually SIGNED photogravures and planographs of images from the book, all encased in a handmade box. Just 55 copies were produced and this is the FIRST and ONLY PRINTING. A magnificent work of art.

Featured Artists: Kelly Grider, Vincent Serbin, Connie Imboden, Josephine Scabo, Don Gregorio Antón, Michal Macku, Andrea Modica, Keith Carter, Sheila Metzner, Mark Kessell, Stephen Berkman, John Metoyer, David Levinthal, Christopher Pekoc and Sally Mann.

The Journal of Contemporary Photography returns to their anthology format in Volume V after two consecutive “special edition” monographs. The artists and writers featured here display an incredible degree of aesthetic control over the 'strange', the unsettling, even the macabre. A ghostly ambiance pervades the works, settling in a hush over each exquisitely printed page. Shiela Metzner makes the cables of a bridge look ominous, while Stephen Berkman's work appears as though from another era, and still other pieces here simply defy description. 21st Editions has put together an amazing collection that seems to work as one congruous piece, exploring different facets of the same artistic universe.

Complete contributing writers: John Wood, Steven Albahari, John Bennette, Ann Beattie, Susan Ludvigson, Lance Speer, Morri Creech, Raúl Peschiera, Paul Larosa, Paul Zimmer, Gerard Malanga and Neil Connelly.

From the Publisher: “Volume V, aptly named Strange Genius, is an insightful examination of the ways in which artists today make conscious attempts to create work that can often be unsettling, difficult, even horrific, yet all the while retaining that strangely mysterious sense of what can only be called beautiful. Writers include poets Raúl Peschiera, Susan Ludvigson, Gerard Malanga, and Paul Zimmer; novelists Ann Beattie and Neil Connelly; and essayists Paul LaRosa, Lance Speer, and John Wood.”

This hardcover title is bound in fine Italian cloth with a spine of quarter Moroccan goatskin. There is no dust jacket, as issued. It is encased in a handmade basswood box, also covered in Italian cloth, measuring 17 x 14.75 inches. There are 204 pages with 10 hand-pulled photogravures, 4 full-color planographs (“hand-printed, high resolution photolithography”) on tissue, and 46 additional dry-trap tritone and color plates. Photogravures produced by Jon Goodman Photogravure in Florence, Massachusetts. Includes notes on the contributors. Designed by Carolyn Eckert. Printed by Trifolio, Verona, Italy, from separations by Robert J. Hennessey. The book itself measures 15.25 x 13.75 inches.