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Item: NEW CONCEPTS ON NUDE PHOTOGRAPHY by Casey Allen.
133+ page large hardback book (28.5cm x 26cm - 882gram) published by Amphoto 1973.
ISBN: 0817403612
Dust-jacket reads:
Nude photography, says Casey Allen, is fascinating, exasperating, frustrating, and, eventually, rewarding. It is probably the most difficult branch of photography to do well, and there's very little worthwhile reference material to use as a guide. As with anything else, experience is the best teacher, but getting experience in photographing nudes is not quite the same as getting experience photographing trees and flowers and buildings (unless you happen to be married to a firstclass model, that is). Appropriately - enough, then, he begins his book with a discussion of how to find the right model. The right model-not just any girl with a good figure who's willing to take off her clothes and stand in front of a camera.
It's just this sort of no-nonsense approach to a difficult yet critical problem that marks this book as one of the best on nude photography to come along in many a year, and which also marks Casey Allen as a man to watch-and listen to. Having little patience with those who take up photographing the nude for reasons other than the perfection of the art ("What they really need is a good psychoanalyst") and those whose vulgarity and eroticism verge on out-andout pornography, he addresses himself to the serious photographer, whether amateur or professional, who wants to take up the most artistically and technically challenging type of photography there is.
Once he has made it clear what the photographer's attitude should be, Allen proceeds to the business at hand, which is how to take the best possible pictures, illustrating his sprightly text with scores of pictures taken specially for this book, including some stunning color shots. Refreshingly, he demonstrates that there is no mystique to nude photography and that the frankly commercial shot can be just as artistically valid and satisfying as some major efforts. (He doesn't push this too far, however. Stieglitz and Weston were artists and none of the commercial people can touch them.) However, it is all balanced and eminently sane, illustrating Allen's overriding concern for art and good taste. New Concepts in Nude Photography is a book that says things that have needed saying for a long time, and should be studied seriously by anyone considering entering the field of nude photography.
Condition: Dust-jacket good condition; split/small piece missing bottom of spine, small split front bottom right-hand corner, split rear top left-hand corner, minor wear to corners/edges, minor foxing/handling marks/marks, priced-clipped (inside removable protective sleeve - photo taken without sleeve). Hardback good/very good condition; minor fading to spine/front top edge, very minor curving front right-hand edge, very clean & bright. Pages good/very good condition; very minor foxing visible when pages viewed collectively top-on (page faces unaffected), page faces very clean & bright.
Collectable
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