Mitch Epstein's "Recreation: American Photographs 1973-1988"

Let me introduce guest blogger Matt, who will be writing an occasional post on photograpy and the visual arts. Here he is on Mitch Epstein.




“Big” and “color” are probably the two words that best describe the contemporary photography scene (add “expensive” if you’re talking about the gallery and museum worlds), and there are a few great books out there that remind us of why this is so. In the past few years, in what appears to be a golden age of photo books, some eye-popping editions have been released to little fanfare (pretending for a moment that fanfare might actually surround a photo book release). The best of these may be Mitch Epstein’s Recreation: American Photographs 1973–1988, published in 2005 by Steidl.

In the galaxy of color photography—and on the planet of American street color in particular—there has always been a short list of heavyweights: William Eggleston, Stephen Shore, Joel Meyerwitz, Joel Sternfeld, and Richard Misrach. With publication of Recreation, Epstein has guaranteed himself a place on that list. Of course, he was working as early, as seriously, and as brilliantly as anyone else in the medium.

This particular body of work shows a tenacity and street sense as keen as that of his teacher, Garry Winogrand, though unlike the old master, Epstein also has a sharp sense of color. And yet, as rich and sumptuous as these images are, Epstein’s real genius is for distilling 1970’s and ’80’s American culture. While the title speaks of American leisure, the “recreations” he captures on film are full of drama and intensity, forming the backdrop for a poignant, politically charged social document about life in the U.S. Epstein looks for America, and finds it in our backyards, resorts, parks, and campgrounds. Places you might not think to look. As it turns out, so much of who we are as Americans can be revealed when we’re at "leisure."

In just one example, plate 41 (pictured above), we see a scene from 1976—the outside of a rain-soaked motel in Miami. Two impossibly beautiful, skinny teenage girls in bikinis huddle over a pay phone, while a pair of middle-age men, crewcut and tan, looking a few years out of the war, smoke cigarettes and hover close to them. Startlingly close. The men are chuckling, but the girls, clearly aware of the men’s presence, make no acknowledgment. It’s a moment as beautiful as it is disturbing, and one full of mystery. The photograph speaks eloquently about power, gender, youth, corruption, family, sex, boredom, and beauty—and like all of the photos in the collection, it captures something essential about modern America.

In short, Mitch Epstein’s Recreation is a force that American street color photographers should reckon with, and a book that all Americans should check out.