Phaidon is releasing an updated and revised edition of American Surfaces, nearly half a century after Stephen Shore originally shot the series. This forthcoming volume includes dozens of previously unpublished photographs and a newly commissioned essay by prominent critic, curator and photographer Teju Cole, who provides a fresh perspective on this body of work.
Shore is one of the most influential living photographers today and is heralded as a pioneer in the use of colour in art photography. In October 1972, he first exhibited a series of 174 postcard-sized photographs he shot on a road trip across America in the early 1970s, titled American Surfaces. Unframed and mounted with double-sided tape to the wall of the Light Gallery in NYC, the work initially confounded critics. These colour snapshots were a stark contrast to the carefully presented archival black- and-white prints widely recognised as art photography at the time. As Shore later described, “I wanted to take pictures that felt natural. I think everyone is familiar with the fact that they often write in a different way than they speak, and that their writing can sometimes seem more stilted, and even use a different vocabulary. And I wanted pictures that felt as natural as speaking. At random moments, whenever I thought of it, I would take what we would call today a screenshot of my field of vision.”
Despite unfavourable reviews, curator Weston Naef bought the show in its entirety and later donated the collection to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Over the years, the series has been widely exhibited and discussed across Europe and the US and American Surfaces is now considered a benchmark for documenting our fast-living, consumer-oriented world—a seminal body of work that continues to inform and influence photographers today.
This is the ideal moment to bring this work back into focus and is a must- have for all photography and popular culture enthusiasts. In the age of Instagram – a creative platform Shore uses daily and one that inspires everybody to take “screenshots of their own fields of vision” – this reissue will no doubt spark new conversations about the art and meaning of documentary photography.
About the authors
Stephen Shore is one of the most influential living photographers. His photographs from the 1970s, taken on road trips across America, established him as a pioneer in the use of colour in art photography. He is director of the photography programme at Bard College, New York.
Teju Cole is a novelist, photographer, critic, curator, and author. He is the Gore Vidal Professor of the Practice of Creative Writing at Harvard.
Stephen Shore: American Surfaces
Stephen Shore and Teju Cole
Published by Phaidon
Binding: Hardback
Extent: 256 pages
Illustrations: 350 colour
Size: 245mm x 210mm
ISBN: 978 1 8386 6062 8
Price: £49.95
