A Strange Necessity: Rebecca West, James Joyce & the artistic impulse

Why does Art matter? What is this strange necessity?

–Rebecca West

…the closer you try to approach the facts through history, the deeper you sink into fiction. The greater the care with which you explain a fact, the more nonsensical a fable you fish out of chaos. – Halldór Laxness, Under the Glacier

In her book-length essay The Strange Necessity, philosopher-writer Rebecca West observed how the creative act could be thought of as a completely holistic and natural force in the world. In the act of creating, the artist becomes a part of nature, fused and connected to the natural world. West’s metaphor of the natural artist is ; “determined and exclusive as the tree’s intention of becoming a tree, and by passing all his material through his imagination and there experiencing it, he achieves the same identity with what he makes as the growing tree does.”[i][1]

Strange Necessity claims the actions of an artist, in the process of creation, comes out of a biological necessity, an unstoppable urge bound up with natural primal desires. The artist is never in total control of the process of creating, but is only fulfilling a natural process bound up within life. The necessity that West explored can be simplified as the “spiritual impulse”, an intuitive connection and higher realm, beyond thought or emotion that resides in the creative act. West further identifies a fundamental unity between all art and experience. The creation of artwork is an engagement with life, a process that’s transcendent, connected with a spiritual purpose.

The Strange Necessity is a moving portrait on the motivations of an artist. In her concluding chapters, West shifts to the exaltation and spiritual function a work of art performs on the individual. It is a relationship to art that borders on the sexual: “I have…this crystalline concentration of glory, this deep and serene and intense emotion that I feel before the greatest works of art… It overflows the confines of the mind and becomes an important physical event…Is this exaltation the orgasm, as it were, of the artistic instinct, stimulated to its height by a work of art…”[ii] This spiritual and orgasmic manifestation of art is noted in the grandiose and sublime landscapes of Frederic Church and J.M.W. Turner, the floating abstraction of Kandinsky, in the mathematical genius of J.S. Bach and Mozart, or the poetry of Melville and Poe; all works that commune with the soul on a metaphysical landscape. This pull toward the spiritual, sublime and orgasmic was fundamental to the development of modernism. Inside Jazz, abstraction, visual art, poetry and fiction, were the release and attributes of a mind in exaltation of the orgasm.

West used the example of a single day of city life to investigate the novel as a creative act and the moving effect of art on her own life. An intensive study of Joyce’s Ulysses takes place inside a single day of West’s life within her home in the city of Paris. This doubling of art and life was itself at the very center of Ulysses, which also takes place in a single day in the life of James Joyce. This entwined process of art and life becomes like an image reflected in a hall of mirrors. Joyce never made public his notice of West’s criticism, however he wrote a scathing put-down of her and a parody of Strange Necessity within his novel Finnegan’s Wake. West takes the example of Joyce as a motivating pendulum in all the arts. The passage of a spiritual or natural transformation from one artist to the next often occurs between written and visual worlds. The simultaneous fractured time and cubism within Joyce is reflected in Picasso paintings, comic books, a Bach concerto and  jazz riffs.

The way art is expressed through society, the way it’s supported, taught, encouraged and rejected, is often based on the timorous relationship between artist and patron and the political mechanics of the time. During times of wealth and industry (the Renaissance is the most obvious example), this relationship can be developed fruitfully and become a concentrated force.

The relationship of funding and material support in the arts is illustrated in Ezra Pound’s comment that, “Great art does not depend on the support of riches, but without such aid it will be individual, separate, and spasmodic: it will not group and become a great period… a great age is brought about only with the aid of wealth, because a great age means the deliberate fostering of genius, the gathering-in and grouping and encouragement of artists.”[iii] This careful balance and support of the arts is often shaken and disposed of in times of great social upheaval and despair, yet this “strange necessity” is present in all eras, and should be viewed as a constant interior force.

Forces of spirit or metaphysics which effect and drive the artist, is a theme often overlooked and diminished. From the nineteenth century “art reform” to contemporary theorists, metaphysical and spiritual influences continue to be downplayed or ignored. The opening of early nineteenth century America to its vast resources and its “manifest destiny” has been a clear source of our nation’s spiritual tensions and troubles. The drive onward instead of inward creates uneasiness and an emphasis on earthbound desires. Conditions of genocide, war, racial divisions and destruction of land and resources can only be reconciled or balanced by spiritual solutions or the transformation of consciousness –conditions that are universal in the art process.

West declared America itself as part of a political necessity; a country of belief and action balanced on a life or death situation. America evolved into existence because of the necessity for freedom, an idea constantly tested and often betrayed by many of America’s leaders. It was once believed that America was founded on and contained the seeds of spiritual freedom, and served as a beacon for other nations. That noble idea of spiritual freedom has gradually been replaced by a slide into greed and selfishness.

The idea of spirituality as unbounded space, without restraint, serves the arts and the areas in which art flourishes. New York City once came close in the 1930s and 40s as a site where the arts could flourish without boundaries. During the development of the ashcan and abstract expressionist schools      modernism took root, at least a modernism outside of European influence. That heroic past has been documented closely and mythologized, yet, the story of cheap rents, artist garrets and a pioneering spirit is not exclusive and is one we return to again and again, in many sites around the globe.

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postscript:

Beauty in things exists merely in the mind which contemplates them. –David Hume, Essays Moral and Political, 1742

The Eighteenth century philosopher David Hume (1711-1776) remained unpopular and  mostly unread until the mid-twentieth century. His idea on beauty was that it existed as fragmented perceptions in the mind. That the mysteries and beauty we seek in art are always “impressions of the mind” –the thoughts and feelings we carry within us through comparisons of experience. Hume said, “power and necessity… are… qualities of perceptions, not of objects… felt by the soul and not perceived externally in bodies”[iv] That fragmented-self idea was later embraced and radicalized by Gilles Deluze and the poststructuralists. We are all parts of a greater whole and the process of art is nothing less then the universe being itself and seeing itself.

The eternal return is woven through the fragmented-mind and its removal of the object of our passion. The artist is on a feedback loop where art and the mind are always one.

[ii] The Strange Necessity, p. 210-211

[iii] Ezra Pound, Ezra Pound and the Visual Arts, Harriet Zinnes, Ed.,  (New Directions, 1980) p. 266

[iv] David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature, (New York: Dover, 2003 edition), p. 168

Technorati Tags: A Strange Necessity, art and meaning, artistic process, creativity, essay, Hume and beauty, James Joyce, Rebecca West

*  *  *   *   *  Devils & Blue Dresses, a review

Mitch Ryder’s autobiography goes well beyond typical eyewitness accounts of sex, drugs and rock n’ roll road stories. His account of rock stardom is one of the most lucid, original, darkly emotional and surreal in rock and roll. In 34 concise chapters, Ryder has penned a passionate and often experimental exposè, told in a distinctly introspective voice, a ‘long nights journey’ through the twisted alleyways of the music business and how his natural talent and notoriety was used and abused by himself and those around him. Readers take caution, this is not a light bedtime story.

Devils & Blue Dresses is an emotionally searing autobiography where Ryder opens his heart and confronts his past with deadly aim. It’s a well-written memoir on music-politics, the weight of fame and identity, and its attendant web of  prizes and perils. The book highlights many tragic-comic episodes both high and low; starting with impoverished scenes of childhood, a dysfunctional home-life and Ryder’s early manipulation and naivety inside the commercial hit-making machine. A string of exceptional high moments sparkle throughout the book; witnessing Bob Dylan’s recording of Highway 61, jamming with Jimi Hendrix (who asked Ryder to be his singer), partying with The Beatles at a countryside LSD retreat after their celebratory release of Sargent Peppers and Hollywood screen tests with Sam Peckinpah and others.

Gifted with one of the greatest voices in rock and blue-eyed-soul history, the teenage Ryder was taken under the wing of producer/manager Bob Crewe, an early 60s hit-single Svengali known for his Four Seasons smash hits; “Big Girls Don’t Cry”, “Walk Like a Man”, “Sherry” and Frankie Valli’s “Can’t Take My Eye’s Off You”. Crewe would indoctrinate Ryder through strange scenes of stardom decadence while ensconced at his posh Dakota apartment in New York City.

Ryder’s first top-ten hit was the Crewe produced wonder “Jenny Take a Ride”  –a rocket of a single that skillfully combined Little Richard’s “C.C. Rider” with “Jenny Jenny” –a classic showcase for Ryder’s high-energy solid gold vocal style. That talent/producer relationship was dramatically revealed by Ryder who said, “Mr. Crewe held all the cards… all of the music appeared on his record labels, or was licensed out, and he held management, recording and publishing contracts… As long as the hit records kept coming, I was safe from the ill will of an industry that, by nature, was insensitive and exploitative and whose executives were, for the most part, angry and bitter at having to suffer the childish abuse of so many of their client victims.”  Ryder himself a ‘client victim’ lost most of his royalties and was bound to medieval contracts that froze his assets. Finally he was forced to beg for a $15,000 down payment on his Southfield, Michigan home –and that became one of the last royalty payments Ryder ever received. His love for music and contempt for the industry is burned deep onto every page.

Ryder’s story is a roller-coaster of comebacks, failures, marriages, infidelities, depressions, suicide attempts, career mistakes and close calls. His association with Barry Kramer at Creem Magazine and manager John Sinclair (of MC5 fame) culminated in a heady lost year, but his reformation of the band Detroit produced his 1971 release Detroit, a blistering rock LP that featured the Lou Reed / Velvet Underground single “Rock ‘N’ Roll”  -one of Ryder’s last hits and a version Lou Reed declared to be definitive.

The book is filled with first hand documents; recording contracts, publicity shots, family photographs and deeply personal poetic side-bar sections titled, “a window to my soul” – italicized journal entries that convey Ryder’s inner thoughts on Southern Antisemitism, Holocaust museums, the feminist movement, “the dysfunctional existence we call American culture”, and his evaluation of poverty, freedom and democracy. Near the book’s end is a twelve page break-up letter and biting personal assessment from his wife Megan, followed by a glossary (Appendix A) that posts an A-Z listing of the artists Ryder met and his recollections of them, some include; Chubby Checker: I wish I knew how to turn a penny into a dollar like he does. Dave Clark Five: The Riveras and I took care of them before we ever had a hit. Janis Joplin: we talked about how tired we both were… we looked like two penniless vagrants … it was a surreal scene.  Little Richard: It was his voice that taught me about energy. Jackie Wilson: …there was Jackie nude on a bed with a nude woman and we conversed for maybe fifteen minutes. Appendix B is Ryder’s outspoken geographic impressions from Canada to Switzerland. Appendix C is a complete discography of singles and albums and Appendix D, “An Essay from Mitch” is a last poetic stream-of-consciousness rage, a Heart of Darkness decent into an empty and bleak apocalypse. A sense of betrayal, anger and vitriol is aimed both at himself, the marketplace and his critics he calls “a pack of vengeful hyenas” – yet through all the pain and rejection there remains the rock steady soul of a Detroit survivor, unafraid to face himself and his demons head-on.

All the loose threads and surreal  juxtapositions give the book a down-home slightly dizzy feel where Ryder may in fact be forging new directions in prose. Sincere and courageous to the nth degree and constructed seemingly without editorial direction, his book is one of the most self-analytic, raw and beautiful memoirs in the history of rock and roll. It’s purity comes from the fact he did this completely himself  and its uncertain how his fans will receive this type of a creative autobiography, but one thing undeniable is that Ryder has laid out the naked truth for all to see and he remains a verifiable Detroit and national treasure.

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Ryder’s book will also accompany a new album, The Promise, his first release in over three decades. Produced by another Detroit legend Don Was, the disc’s dozen tracks feature eleven originals plus a live cover for the Motown classic “What Becomes of the Brokenhearted.” Copies of the new CD will be made available during the signing from our next door neighbors at Street Corner Music. We appreciate your support of this event, for more information please call: (248)-968-1190

Technorati Tags: book signing, Detroit music, Devils and Blue Dresses, Mitch Ryder, Rock and Roll, The Detroit Wheels

To take photographs means to recognize—simultaneously and within a fraction of a second—both the fact itself and the rigorous organization of visually perceived forms that give it meaning. It is putting one’s head, one’s eye and one’s heart on the same axis.

– Henri Cartier-Bresson

Take care of all your memories…  for you can not relive them. -Bob Dylan

From poetic and humorous recordings of family life and urban landscapes to his surprising tabletop conceptual works, Bill Rauhauser’s photography has always been stamped with clarity of thought, gentle beauty and an eye for composition. His decades long love affair with Detroit, modernism, photo history and the organization of forms and their refinement is an inspiring tale. He is at the age of 93, still questioning, developing and recreating himself as an artist.

There’s nothing sentimental, passive or decorative about Rauhauser’s street work yet they contain a romantic and passionate core, all beautifully rendered black and white images, each a small poignant story.  Some of the best work is risky, unconscious, snapshot driven and yet also carefully composed, implanted with his memories and a respect for  the city and its culture. The urban landscape is the main star in a Rauhauser photograph.

Detroit has become a favorite location for photographers in the recent past, chosen as the symbolic and literal center of the post-industrial wasteland. Many books have documented its magnificent ruins. Rauhauser’s investigation was a prelude to the ruins, a map before the crime-scene, familiar territory for anyone brought up in Detroit in the 1950s-60s.

There is something fatally romantic about an urban photographer in the mid-1950s wandering freely throughout Detroit. Rauhauser’s practice both coincided and sometimes mirrored the beat era mythology that grew around the wandering figures of Robert Frank and Jack Keroauc, whose On the Road was published to a sensational response in 1957. Being anchored to Detroit in the 1950s was a much less fashionable and frenetic situation for Rauhauser, but perhaps a more truthful one. He was stuck in the quintessential American city, the crucible and furnace of  Fordism, where the struggles of race and class played out in everyday life.

After describing a visit to Henri Cartier-Bresson’s exhibition at MOMA in 1947, as a “revelatory” one, Rauhauser quickly realized that his life’s passion and career path would soon be devoted to photography. The idea of eternity frozen in a photograph – life organized and contained in a single ‘Decisive Moment’ rang true for Rauhauser, and he began spending his free time on the streets with a Leica 35mm rangefinder (the same preferred camera of Cartier-Bresson).

In 1955, a photograph by Rauhauser (Three Figures on a Bench) was chosen by Edward Steichen for his “Family of Man” exhibition, one of the most successful and viewed photo exhibits in history, seen by over nine million people. Rauhauser took that as an encouraging sign and he continued his street work with renewed vigor. 1955 was also the same year Robert Frank began his cross-country photo project that would result in “The Americans” – another milestone in photo history. Frank’s snapshot aesthetic held a fascination for Rauhauser, who was already  practicing those methods himself on the streets of Detroit.

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Rauhauser has often referred to himself as a flânuer, a wandering urban observer, sampling and documenting the rhythms and pace of the city.  The flânuer was a term popularized by Charles Baudelaire to describe the slow city-gazing, 19^th century window-shopping dandy of his time – the romantic wanderer of the urban landscape. Baudelaire admired photography’s documentary nature but also despised and thwarted its fine art applications. In his essay On Photography of 1859, he describes the dual nature of photography and where he saw it headed, “If photography is allowed to supplement art in some of its functions, it will soon have supplanted or corrupted it altogether, thanks to the stupidity of the multitude which is its natural ally. It is time, then, for it to return to its true duty, which is to be the servant of the sciences and arts… Let it rescue from oblivion those tumbling ruins, those books, prints and manuscripts which time is devouring, precious things whose form is dissolving and which demand a place in the archives of our memory—— it will be thanked and applauded.”[i]

The book Bill Rauhauser 20^th Century Photography in Detroit is a treasure trove for what it preserves of Motor City life, especially the era following World War II when streets were still filled with vendors, shoppers and energetic activity of all kinds. Rauhauser concentrated his walks along Woodward Avenue, Mid-town (Wayne State University), the riverfront, Belle Isle, and took to documenting small working class homes and the city’s architectural gems. The vibrancy of those times marks a stark contrast to how the fortunes of the automotive capital would slowly unravel.

In over 300 black and white images we journey with Rauhauser in a city overflowing with consumerist euphoria, determination and grit –scenes abundant with immediacy and excitement. The photograph Sander’s Lunch Counter, Woodard Avenue, Detroit shows a group of three women enjoying ice-cream on a typical hot summer’s day, the middle figure blowing a frozen funnel of cigarette smoke into the air, a scene most Detroiters of a certain age can identify with –and there are many others, like the series of the Michigan State Fair sideshow barker’s and their sexy but dangerous looking carnival gals. Street preachers, rushing lunchtime office workers, newsstands, fruit vendors, street cleaners, gamblers, musicians, barbershops, students, bikers and fashionable women fill the book with a timeless lost-world glow. The photos are presented with little or no captions, but they will gain in awareness over time, true vessels of how we saw ourselves and once lived in Detroit before the apocalypse of ruins.

Gazing over the book is like walking through fields of memory, recognizing scenes from a past gone-to-dust and a history belonging to all who’ve lived it or care to see. There are many isolated and lost figures; lonely seniors, tired park-bench warmers, beggars, pimps and bums  -the outsiders of society found in daily encounters that break down and disrupt “normal” social order – gatherings and crowded street scenes dissipate into fragile moments of reflection and despair, slices of life’s existential sadness – tiny miracles caught in time.

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There’s a wealth of material to soak in, amazing jaw-dropping images that stop you in your tracks. Here’s mid-century Motown, alive with a variety of activities, barbershop rituals, bus-stop ques and swaggering soul brothers and sistahs. One small section devoted to Detroit auto-shows in the 1960s is one of the book’s strongest highlights. Young models with exaggerated flipped up hair-dos, million-dollar smiles, mini-skirts and go-go boots light up the Cobo Hall displays selling sex and sizzle alongside the latest Detroit muscle cars.

This decades-long self-assignment aligns well with many other urban photo projects such as Atget’s life-long study of the monuments and beauty of Paris, Arnold Genthe’s Chinatown in turn-of-the-century San Francisco and the New York Photo League’s gritty documentation of New York City in the 40s and 50s. Rauhauser’s work clearly shows the lighthearted sense of improvisation and quick thinking he brings to street photography, which is the main attraction filling most of the book. It should remain the standard reference for displaying Detroit in classic mid-century for years to come.

Rauhauser’s street scenes are varied in technique and subject matter, ranging from posed snapshots, to comical, uninhibited, and voyeuristic off-the-hip shooting. Many photographs are the result of strong technical ability matched with careful planning and dumb chance. The Zen-like presence of the photographer is there to see and think ahead, becoming invisible to his surroundings and subject. For the most part his subjects are caught off-guard and unaware of the camera. Rauhauser’s key distinction is a graphically charged and constructive eye that builds a photograph from layers of physical reality and desire (the subject matter) against the balanced dispersal of light and darkness.

He once said, “I see in black and white.”- a vision used with good effect alongside the complexity of moving subjects and architectural backgrounds. I think Bill also see’s in shades of desire;  a pretty figure, sophisticated well-dressed ladies, women in bathing suits, leggy dancers, snake-charmers, sexy backsides, young women smoking, modeling and performing  – a luxuriant parade of beauties and delights!

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Several images quote important historic photographs, an ability that came naturally and perhaps unconsciously to Rauhauser with his deep knowledge of photo history. There’s the Atget-like side view of a man in thick boots wheeling a heavy loaded cart of cardboard across the street (p.92) looking plucked from another century and several movement-freezing shots echoing Martin Munkacsi; (p. 83, 143) who once said, “all great photographs today are snapshots.” Rauhuaser’s image of four young blacks on the beach of Lake Michigan (p.114) harken back to the iconic Munkacsi image, Black Boys ashore Lake Tanganyika taken in 1931, an image Cartier-Bresson credited “as the only photograph to ever inspire me.”

Overloaded streets filled with humanity combined with Rauhauser’s eye for women bring to mind Gary Winogrand’s “Women are Beautiful”  series ; (p.134, 148, 155, 178, 213) and the flattened almost painted looking urban cityscapes of Aaron Siskind; (p. 100, 130, 164, 194) or the pool-hall greasers of Danny Lyon (p. 62, 209, 219) and the urban lunch counters of Robert Frank; (p. 60, 81). His image of the tough bee-hived French Fry Girl from either Bob-lo island or the State Fair is a powerful 60s portrait, close to iconic. Visual puns and mirrored images abound like the ridiculous toy-car parade Shriner’s convention, Detroit 1978, (p.184), or the odd man at the State Fair unconsciously mimicking a circus banner behind him (p.227) or the Weegee-like bum sleeping off his drunk in the doorway: Cass Avenue, Detroit (p.103).

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The still-life series Rauhauser began in late 1960s became known as the “Object Series”. Dejarlais notes in the book’s introduction, “He purposely photographed objects that were invisible to society because of their daily functional use…using a 4×5 view camera he aimed for intense clarity and lit them for optimal revelation of detail…”  He furthered these experiments by exploring object abstractions that ended in a series of totally wild black and white architecturally constructed objects, the Egyptian titled Temples and Tombs series –a totally unique body of work in the history of photography, one he discovered by himself and owns –a series created out of found materials and discarded kitchen utensils. These fantastical high contrast works were produced sometime in the late 1970s and early 1980s, a humorous conceptual and creatively jarring body of work, perhaps an antidote to his earlier street photography.

The still life constructions were extensions of the photographer’s passion for architecture (his first profession) and are non-manipulated, experiments in free-form expression. The Temples and Tombs series are self-contained utopian worlds, surrealist M.C. Escher post-objects, (almost a reversal of documentation).  The series developed at a time when it was more difficult to work in the street. By the 1980s privacy issues became dominant and the streets were becoming more dangerous. Rauhauser explained that with the still life work, he went into himself and pushed the straight “truth telling” aspect of photography to an extreme edge. The Temples and Tombs were an answer to an exit, analytic fragments of  truth found in architectural abstraction, like something Frank Ghery would make from crumpled wastepaper. They are deceptively clever tabletop fantasies – chaotic yet ordered, strange and alien perception puzzles of pure form.

Rauhauser’s 1970s elemental object series and still lifes are relatives to Marcel Duchamp’s revolutionary notion of the readymade[ii]. By isolating the found object, removing it from its normal usage and understanding, Duchamp wished to challenge the viewer and what we accept as works of art. Duchamp presented the bicycle wheel, urinal, bottle rack and the snow shovel – the everyday object as some of the first minimalist artworks – what he called “a form denying the possibility of defining art”.

Where Duchamp wanted to go against the grain and destroy “retinal art” with his readymade sculptures, Rauhauser emphasized the beauty and aesthetics of simple objects and common sculptural form; the baseball, derby hat, music stand, ruler, rain boot, transistor radio tube, etc., the everyday objects he was attracted to for primarily aesthetic and functional reasons – objects whose “form followed function.”  These were then presented as purely clean and flat minimalist “retinal art” – a sly reversal of Duchamp’s approach. The photographic isolation of the object became a commonly used devise that would influence book and graphic illustration to a staggering degree by the early 1990s. Rauhauser’s careful choice of objects are linked in a self-referential index – functional forms that also register as signs and symbols in the photographer’s visual autobiography.

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The book’s lack of complete annotations is a mystery, a small flaw that could be fixed in a later printing. The dark grey chapter headings are abrupt and intrusive beside the photos, upsetting the flow of the book. The overall size is about 8.5 x 11″ and is overly generous with photos in a short span, over 300 images appear in 311 pages.  The paper is of good quality with almost no bleed-through and a soft varnish was added to the photos which have a great tonal range and appear printed in tri-tone or full color. The decorative glossy cover is a great graphic image of a summertime parade down Woodard Avenue with the world’s largest American flag flapping on the side of the Hudson’s department store, a female photographer shooting her family, with her prominent ass in the foreground. The book design is functional, but could be improved with a looser, less crowded layout and little more research for the captions.

A 30 page introductory text by Mary Dejarlais gives a close inspection to Rauhauser’s history and background, his formation as an artist and educator, from his beginnings in Detroit’s Silhouette camera club to his current adoption of digital photography. Dejarlais lays out the influences and histories that informed Rauhuaser’s photography and thought, including his friendship with photo dealer Tom Halsted and central figures Cartier-Bresson, Robert Frank and film theorist Siegfried Kracauer.

Dejarlais’ introduction also makes clear Rauhauser’s contributions to photography and the city. Over the course of five decades many area students (who are now professional photographers) had taken Rauhauser’s classes at the Society of Arts and Crafts, later the College for Creative Studies (CCS). As a teacher and photo collector he exposed students to firsthand examples of famous photo works, originals he brought into the classroom. In 1964, Rauhauser opened Gallery Four, one of the first galleries in the US devoted exclusively to photography. He was also responsible in the early 1960s for bringing the attention of collecting and appreciating photography as an art-form to the Detroit Institute of Arts, one of the first national museums to display an interest in the medium.

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Rauhauser has worked a lifetime in semi-isolation (a common situation in Detroit), but its one of the aspects he most enjoys. Detroit allowed him the freedom of anonymity, of walking the streets unfettered and for many years the city proved to be a trusted canvas and muse. He has not spent his time searching for exhibitions or promoting his work outside the city (even though there are few opportunities in Detroit for exhibiting or receiving critical feedback). He works along self-imposed rules, free to explore anywhere his imagination takes him.

When thinking of Rauhauser’s extended street project, I’m reminded of the quietly eccentric and stoic Eugene Atget (1857-1927), a photographer who witnessed and documented the working classes alongside the 19th century grandeur and transformation of Paris, lugging his heavy view camera across the city photographing beggars and prostitutes to regal palaces and elegant parks. Atget was unrecognized by the public but enthusiastically followed and collected by a small group of surrealist artists who eventually saved his work from certain destruction. Images taken by Atget now construct our view and how we think about Paris from the late 1890s and early 1900s. They are a transformational archive.

Bill Rauhauser 20^th Century Photography in Detroit is not the glossy hallmark tour of the Motor City you might expect. The Book is a gritty but sincere survey across a sixty-year arc of Detroit images, from its industrial peak to its gradual decline. It’s raw do-it-yourself  journalism of the common man, an urban spectacle and a private diary of the past, one photographer’s long term affair with photography, photographic history and Detroit, and is unlike anything published on the city before. Rauhauser is a stealthy, acute observer and flânuer of daily life, a masterful sage in our midst.

Bibliographic Coda

Just over 10 years ago, after Bill Rauhauser’s retirement from CCS, he began to seriously collect and organize the body of his photographic work. These reflections become a source of renewal for the photographer who has made a public offering in the form of books and donations of  artwork. Major collections of his photographs now reside in the Detroit Institute of Arts and the Burton Library in Detroit. Soon after the publication of 20th Century Photography in Detroit, a man in the audience during Bill’s presentation at the Book Beat, purchased an extra copy for his niece who is a curator of photography at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. The Museum then showed an interest in purchasing works and were recently given a donation of original silver prints by Mr. Rauhauser for their permanent collection. 

Bill Rauhauser 20^th Century Photography in Detroit (2010) is the most comprehensive monograph of Rauhaser’s work to date. It also  compliments several other books he produced and helped to publish over the past decade; Detroit Revisited (2000) with photographer’s John Thomas Baldwin and Gene Meadows, text by Mary Dejarlais, Bob-Lo Revisited (2003) with text by Martin Magid, Detroit: Auto Show Images of the 1970s (2007) and Beauty on Detroit Streets (2008) text by Mary Dejarlais. All should be known to anyone with an interest in photography, urban studies and the history of Detroit. Rauhauser and Dejarlais  have recently formed a new joint publishing partnership named Cambourne Publishing and we eagerly look forward to future volumes.

Last Note: The famous Three Figures on a Bench photo shown at the beginning of this article was later appropriated and cast in bronze by another artist. It was a life-sized replica of the photo, except it showed the figures engaged in sex, but that’s a story for another time.

[ii] on the readymade: Introduction, ToutFait Towards a Definition at http://www.toutfait.com/unmaking_the_museum/introduction1.html

Technorati Tags: 20th Century Photography in Detroit, Bill Rauhauser, detroit art, Detroit Photography, photography book review

Knockout Picture Books for reading aloud & for early readers:

Belle, The Last Mule at Gee’s Bend (hardcover)

A true story from the civil rights movement

When African-Americans in a poor community– inspired by a visit from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.– defied local authorities who were trying to stop them from registering to vote, many got around a long detour on mule-drawn wagons. Later, after Dr. King’s assassination, two mules from Gee’s Bend pulled the farm wagon bearing his casket through the streets of Atlanta. As Alex looks into the eyes of gentle Belle, he begins to understand a powerful time in history in a very personal way.

A true story inspires the moving tale of a mule that played a key role in the civil rights movement– and a young boy who sees history anew. Staff Favorite Ages 5 and up

The Cats in the Doll Shop (hardcover)

A Russian/Jewish story for ages 7-11

The Cat in the Doll Shop by Yona Zeldis McDonough is a fictional book aimed at the younger crowd. This book is a sequel to The Doll Shop Downstairs.

Anna, whose family owns a doll shop, discovered a cat in the yard behind the store. What made it even more exciting is that the cat is about to have kittens….

A Sick Day for Amos McGee (Hardcover)

Michigan Author & Illustrator  & Winner of the Caldecott Award 2011

“…short and gentle enough to make a fine bedtime story for any child who is getting tired of Goodnight Moon.” – One Minute Reviews

“The artwork in this quiet tale of good deeds rewarded uses woodblock-printing techniques, soft flat colors, and occasional bits of red. Illustrations are positioned on the white space to move the tale along and underscore the bonds of friendship and loyalty. Whether read individually or shared, this gentle story will resonate with youngsters.” – School Library Journal,  Staff Favorite: Ages 2 and up

These Hands (Hardcover)

A Detroit Inter-generational Civil Rights Story

“Loving view of gains across generations.” – Chicago Tribune,  Ages 6-9

“With tenderness and pride, a grandfather shares the many skills of his hands with his grandson, who is a happy student. Those hands can tie knots, play the piano, perform card tricks and swing a baseball bat. The text is beautifully cadenced. “Well, I can still teach a young fellow / how to do a waterfall shuffle / —yes I can.” But then comes the mood-shattering remembrance. Those hands, not so very long ago, could not touch the dough in the Wonder Bread factory. Those hands did not stay still: They joined in protest with many other hands and voices and achieved equality. The little boy learns all his lessons well, with a tasty loaf of bread as his crowning achievement. The author has based her story on conversations with an African-American bakery union activist, according to her author’s note. Cooper’s signature artwork in muted shades of yellows and browns intensifies the warmth of the intergenerational bonding.” –Kirkus Review

No Dogs Allowed!

A sublimely touching and funny story… a charmer for cat and dog lovers…

Feline friends Bud and Gabby are back! But this time—and much to Bud’s dismay—there’s a dog in the picture. The dog’s name is Cookie, and although fun-loving Gabby enjoys Cookie’s company, grouchy Bud does not. In fact, Bud gets so fed up with Cookie that he kicks her out of the house. “No dogs allowed!” he declares. But when a big black rain cloud approaches and Gabby looks worried, will Bud have a change of heart?

I am Small

Cuddle up with your little penguin this winter!

“Dodd chooses a carefully designed spatial arrangement of the text and simple, visual language, repeating the refrain “and I am small” as the little one encounters all that largeness, creating empathy and understanding for the timid little penguin without being overly sweet or cloying.A lovely, reassuring bedtime story with a simple message of parental affection that littlest listeners and readers will take to heart.”  -Kirkus

Neville

One of the BEST storytelling books we’ve come across this year! Staff Fave: Ages 4-8

Written by the acclaimed author of “The Phantom Tollbooth, ” this is a simply told story about a boy who moves to a new neighborhood and finds a unique way to make friends. With whimsical illustrations by award-winning illustrator G. Brian Karas, here is a read-aloud that’s great for storytime, and is sure to be a hit among fans of Juster, Karas, and anyone who is “the new kid on the block.”

I Will Not Read This Book

Excuses, Excuses… Ages 4-8

“I Will Not Read This Book” is pitch perfect for anyone who has ever dealt with a reluctant child. Much of the reluctance comes from doing things on their own, and as we see in this book, once someone the boy loves has someone to read with him, the reluctance goes away.  -crackingthecover.com

Too Many Frogs!

Cupcake colors animate Nana Quimby’s kitchen and her friendly urban neighborhood, while silly noises (“thump-thump-bang-bang-bonk”), repeating phrases, and improbable numbers (“She opened the door, and a million frogs hopped, jumped, bumped, and bounced across the kitchen floor”) keep this sweet tale moving smartly along. Most satisfying is the way that the children get to order Nana Quimby around, and the humility with which she obeys them. Ages 4–8.

Check out author Hassett’s Frog-filled Home!

The Crown on Your Head

YOU WERE BORN TO SHINE!

Aimed at smaller children, The Crown on Your Head makes statements and then backs them up with a simple explanation most children will understand. Every colorful page of the book portrays a child living life to the fullest. If you’re looking for a short picture book capable of expressing your love toward a child, this may be the book for you.  Ages 4-8

Queen of the Falls (hardcover, signed 1st edition)

Classic Chris Van Allsburg

“His first non-fiction work, Queen of the Falls (2011) is also one of Chris Van Allsburg’s best.  Indeed, in some ways it marks a return to form….” – Nine Kinds of Pie

“Queen of the Falls is an amazing tale of the power of nature — and of the little old lady who might be considered the precursor of today’s reality-show stars. And for kids, it’s a vivid demonstration that you don’t have to be young to do something really, really dumb in pursuit of fame and fortune.”  -WIRED

Signed, first edition copies of Chris Van Allsburg’s Queen of the Falls are still available! Staff Favorite: Ages 6 and up.

Mouse and Lion (hardcover)

A Uniquely Retold Aesop Classic for All Ages

“No, this isn’t the story you think it is. Note that the top billing is reversed. Rand Burkert — who wonders whether Aesop was an apocryphal African storyteller — suggests that different Aesop’s fables show the lion sometimes as a tyrant but sometimes still teachable. Few artists can make the coats of both a lion and a mouse call out equally for a touch, but Nancy Ekholm Burkert’s careful pen-and-ink drawings and watercolor washes do just that and help us enjoy the newness.” – Chicago Tribune  Ages 4-8

Love Mouserella (hardcover) $15.99

This may inspire children to write to someone they love, for Ages 3-7

Mouserella misses her grandmouse, so she writes her a letter. At first she can’t think of anything to say, but once she starts, the news begins to flow – she found a cat whisker at the zoo, she taught her ladybug to fetch, she made shadow puppets with Dadmouse during a blackout – and just like that, the events of the past few days come to vivid life in her letter, as does her love for Grandmouse.

Children will enjoy reading the story from top to bottom, like a real letter, and Mouserella’s funny drawings and lively adventures will spark their imaginations and just might inspire them to start a correspondence of their own.

Jonathan and the Big Blue Boat (hardcover) $16.99

Exceptional art, sensitive story reunite a boy and his bear. Ages 2-5

When Jonathan loses his best friend, a stuffed bear named Frederick, he sets sail on the Big Blue Boat to find him. Along the way he assembles a ragtag crew, including a mountain goat, a lonely circus elephant, and even a friendly whale. Adventure and intrigue (and pirates!) follow.

Stars (hardcover) $16.99

Twilight is a liminal moment, especially in a child’s day.

A star is how you know it’s almost night,” looking over the shoulder of a little boy, dog-walking, looking toward a star in the twilight sky. In a loose star-celebrating narrative, Mary Lyn Ray and Marla Frazee direct our gaze to the mind- and heart-lifting power of stars — both in the night sky and in the star shapes around us. The text recognizes the power of stars children are given at school, for instance, or meritorious stars they might make for themselves. Blue-sky-thinking, luminous children are set against a sky-blue palette.  -Chicago Tribune   Ages 2-6

Never Forgotten (hardcover) $18.99

Forceful & Iconic – a treasured keepsake for African-American families

In eighteenth-century West Africa, a boy raised by his blacksmith father and the Mother Elements–Wind, Fire, Water, and Earth–is captured and taken to America as a slave.

The willingness to turn the dark history of the past into literature takes not just talent but courage. McKissack has both. All ages. -Publisher’s Weekly Ages 6 and up

Making a Friend

What you love will always be with you  

Bestselling author, Alison McGhee reminds us all that nothing that has been cared for can ever disappear for good, for, “What you love will always be with you.” And, this tender story about the power of friendship will stay with readers long after they turn the last page. Ages 4 and up

A Nation’s Hope: The Story of Joe Louis

Introducing Joe Louis to a New Generation                                                                                                       a NY TIMES BEST ILLUSTRATED OF THE YEAR 2011!

On the eve of World War II, African American boxer Joe Louis fought German Max Schmeling in a bout that had more at stake than just the world heavyweight title; for much of America their fight came to represent America’s war with Germany. This elegant and powerful picture book biography centers around the historic fight in which Black and White America were able to put aside prejudice and come together to celebrate our nation’s ideals.  Ages 6 and up.

Bun Bun Button

This heartwarming story celebrates the special bond between grandparents and grandchildren, and is perfect for children who imagine their toys have secret adventures when no one’s watching. Ages 3 and up.

Patricia Polacco (www.patriciapolacco.com) was inspired to tell this story when a young visitor to one of her programs brought the much loved and tattered real-life Bun Bun Button up to her table – and gave it to her. Patricia is the beloved creator of over fifty picture books, and is also an energetic and enthusiastic public speaker – she visits over one hundred classrooms every year.

We Are All Born Free Mini Edition: The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Pictures

“This is an important book, best shared with children in a setting where discussion of both the rights and the illustrations is encouraged.”  – PW

This beautiful collection, published 60 years on, celebrates each declaration with an illustration by an internationally-renowned artist or illustrator and is the perfect gift for children and adults alike.

Memoirs of a Goldfish (hardcover, signed )

Michigan Library Association Book Choice ages 3 and up

With his bowl to himself and his simple routine, Goldfish loves his life..until assorted intruders invade his personal space and bowl. Goldfish rethinks the pros and cons of a solitary life. And discover what he’s been missing.

Middle Readers & Young Adults

Pie (signed 1st edition, hardcovers)

“A delicious, fun read, this book of pie and mystery is a treat whether read with alamode or alone. It’s an ideal book for classroom sharing as well, after all who doesn’t like pie?” – Waking Brain Cells, Appropriate for ages 9-12.

“PIE, set in Ipswitch during the summer of 1955, is a high-spirited, hoot of a whodunit for upper elementary and middle school readers.  This tale is going to inspire a mess of pie baking in your neck of the woods…Those who are familiar with a certain famous and esteemed children’s literature award are going to get quite a belly laugh out of reading the history and details of the national pie making award that Polly wins an unprecedented thirteen times in a row.  And as sure as life imitates art, I bet that there will be a passel of people dishing about PIE when the year-end lists are being compiled.” – Richie’s Picks

Vordak the Incomprehensible : Rule the School (hardcover, signed edition)

“Prepare to be conquered by the world’s funniest supervillian”

But this isn’t just an instruction manual for school-age world dominating wannabes. Grown-ups will get plenty of tips themselves, and the humor with which the book is written is great for all ages. I, particularly, took plenty of notes in my Take Over the World notebook. When I wasn’t laughing maniacally, that is. -WIRED.com  Ages 9 and up.

The Unwanteds (fantasy, signed, hardcover) Ages 13 and up

“Imagination runs wild in this creative adventure.” – NY TIMES

The Hunger Games meets Harry Potter… [The Unwanteds] is sure to be a double hit.” ~ Kirkus Reviews

“Reading Lisa McMann’s THE UNWANTEDS was like discovering a brilliant, lost children’s classic—except it’s never going to be lost, because readers will never, ever forget the magic they’ll experience in its pages.” –James A. Owen, author and Illustrator of HERE, THERE BE DRAGONS

The Big Crunch

Hautman skillfully subverts clichés in this subtle, authentic, heart-tugging exploration of first love, but his sharp-eyed view of high-school social dynamics and the loving friction between parents and teens on the edge of independence is just as memorable. Grades 8-12. –Gillian Engberg, Booklist

A funny, clear-eyed view of the realities of teenage love from National Book Award winner Pete Hautman.

Jen and Wes do not “meet cute.” They do not fall in love at first sight. They do not swoon with scorching desire. They do not believe that they are instant soul mates destined to be together forever….

The Chronicles of Harris Burdick: 14 Amazing Authors Tell the Tales

The Visionary Art of Chris Van Allsburg Inspires Best-selling Writers

“There are no clunkers here. Each contribution has its own telltale flavor of menace, leaving readers to discover their favorites. For those wishing to catch a good fright while simultaneously having their leg pulled, Jon Scieszka’s light-gauge horror story toys gingerly with the genre’s conventions, mingling chatter about dust bunnies with a veiled reference to cannibalism. Readers who would rather step headlong into “Twilight Zone” territory will enjoy M. T. Anderson’s creepy account of a boy who accidentally learns that reality is nothing more than a fabrication designed for his benefit, or Walter Dean Myers’s resonant fable about a book that has a different ending each time it is read.” –NY Times, Reading level: Middle grades -Ages 10-15

Tuesdays at the Castle

This delightful book from a fan- and bookseller-favorite kicks off a brand-new series sure to become a modern classic. Ages 8 and up.

“This enjoyable romp turns mischief into political action and a stone palace into a cunning character. These kids are clever, as is George’s lively adventure. May pique castle envy.” —Kirkus Reviews

The Apothecary

“…intricately constructed plot, well-paced suspense, credibly rendered fantastical elements, thoughtfully drawn characters and authentically detailed settings, satisfies on all levels.” – NY Times, Ages 10-14 years.

A mysterious apothecary. A magic book. A missing scientist. An impossible plan. It’s 1952 and the Scott family has moved unexpectedly from Los Angeles to London. There, fourteen-year-old Janie gets a homesickness cure from the neighborhood apothecary and becomes fascinated by his defiant son, Benjamin Burrows—a boy struggling with his destiny, who isn’t afraid to stand up to authority and who dreams of becoming a spy.

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children

Found photography drives ‘Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children’

“It’s a gothic tale with a teenage protagonist, which is why the publisher is marketing it as a young adult novel, but I read it and liked it, and I’m in my 30s. The book came about when Riggs started collecting found photography at flea markets and swap meets about three years ago.  He kept coming across strange creepy pictures of kids and felt like he wanted to do something with them. ..” –LA Times

A mysterious island. An abandoned orphanage. And a strange collection of very curious photographs. It all waits to be discovered in Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, an unforgettable novel that mixes fiction and photography in a thrilling reading experience. As our story opens, a horrific family tragedy sets sixteen-year-old Jacob journeying to a remote island off the coast of Wales, where he discovers the crumbling ruins of Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children. Staff favorite; Ages 13 and up.

Blood Red Road (hardcover, signed)

“Better than The Hunger Games. . . . This book will blow you away.” – MTV Crush

“Recommended to fans of sci-fi post-apocalyptic fiction.  Readers who are missing new installments of The Hunger Games might find a kindred book spirit here.” –Early Nerd Special

“Young’s powerful debut, first in the Dustlands series, is elevated above its now familiar postapocalyptic setting by an intriguing prose style and strong narrative voice that show a distinct Cormac McCarthy vibe. It’s a natural for Hunger Games fans.”  _ PW

Blood Red Road has a searing pace, a poetically minimal writing style, violent action, and an epic love story. Moira Young is one of the most promising and startling new voices in teen fiction. Ages 13 and up.

Our bestselling title! More than a photographic saturation job of a single city, Detroit: 138 Square Miles provides contextual perspective in an extended caption section in which Reyes Taubman collaborated with University of Michigan professors Robert Fishman and Michael McCullough to emphasize the social imperatives driving her documentation. An essay by native Detroiter and bestselling author Elmore Leonard addresses the social and cultural significance of the post-industrial condition of this metropolis. The volume’s spine is specially treated with black ink to evoke the industrial character of its subject. A more in-depth review is available at DETROIT: 138 SQUARE MILES: ELEGANCE, RUST & SOUL

Fever: Little Willie John; A Fast Life, Mysterious Death and the Birth of Soul  (SIGNED COPIES AVAILABLE!)

“Little Willie John is the soul singer’s soul singer.” – Marvin Gaye.

“My mother told me, if you call yourself ‘Little’ Stevie Wonder you’d better be as good as Little Willie John.” – Stevie Wonder

The soaring heights of Little Willie John’s career are matched only by the tragic events of his death, cutting short a life so full of promise. Charged with a violent crime in the late 1960s, an abbreviated trial saw Willie convicted and incarcerated in Walla Walla Washington, where he died under mysterious circumstances in 1968.

In this, the first official biography of one of the most important figures in rhythm & blues history, author Susan Whitall, with the help of Little Willie John’s eldest son Kevin John, has interviewed some of the biggest names in the music industry and delved into the personal archive of the John family to produce an unprecedented account of the man who invented soul music.

Glenn Barr’s Faces (SIGNED COPIES AVAILABLE)

Glenn Barr presents a 96-page compilation book featuring details from 80 paintings and drawings he created over the past five years. Inspired by the complex expressions and raw emotions revealed by faces, Barr invokes the human condition, creating a multitude of personalities ranging from extraordinarily common to extreme and fantastic.  Visit our in-store Glenn Barr pop-up shop in the backroom gallery just for the holidays – check out 4 new poster designs on heavy weight gloss paper, available at $20. each, plus a new GBarr sketchbook zine : HEEP #4 ( SIGNED COPIES OF HEEP!!)

Detroit Television: Images of America Series

Detroit broadcasting history is rich with character . . . and characters. It began atop the Penobscot Building on October 23, 1946, when WWDT shot a signal to the convention center, part of a “New Postwar Products Exposition.” WWJ-TV offered scheduled programming in June 1947, and WXYZ-TV and WJBK-TV jumped in a year later. The medium has influenced the city’s personality and social agenda ever since. Soupy Sales turned getting a pie in the face into an art form. Mort Neff celebrated the state’s outdoor charms. George Pierrot showed Detroiters the world. Other beloved personalities include: Milky the Clown, Ed McKenzie, Sonny Eliot, John Kelly, Marilyn Turner, Robin Seymour, Bill Bonds, Dick Westerkamp, Jingles, Bill Kennedy, Lou Gordon, Captain Jolly, Johnny Ginger, Auntie Dee, and many more.

Detroitland: A Collection of Movers, Shakers, Lost Souls, and History Makers from Detroit’s Past

Detroitland contains the stories behind familiar names like Frank Murphy, the infamous Purple Gang, the Lone Ranger, “Potato Patch” Pingree, and Charles Lindbergh. Yet Bak also reveals lesser-known episodes in Detroit’s history, like the ambitious International Exposition & Fair of 1889; the killer heat wave of 1936, with five straight days of hundred-degree temperatures; and the attempted around-the-world flight of Ed Schlee and Billy Brock in the Pride of Detroit in 1927. He introduces readers to little-known and unique Detroit characters, like the fierce Black Legion gang that was Detroit’s own version of the Ku Klux Klan; Johnny Miler, the man who walloped Joe Louis in the Brown Bomber’s first-ever amateur fight; patrolman Ben Turpin, the terror of Black Bottom criminals; Sophie Lyons, legendary “Queen of the Underworld” and Detroit philanthropist; and Shorty Long, Brenda Holloway, the Velvelettes, and other forgotten Motown artists of the ’60s.

313: Life in the Motor City (SIGNED COPIES AVAILABLE!)

A native of Detroit, John Carlisle has written about and photographed the city for the Metro Times for four years under the name Detroitblogger John, a pen name based on his longstanding web project, detroitblog. He has also been a contributor to Hour Detroit magazine and an editor at the C&G Newspapers chain. A graduate of Wayne State University’s journalism program, Carlisle has won numerous awards over the years for his writing and photography and was named Journalist of the Year in 2011 by the Detroit chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.

Parallel Universe: Detroit/Tokyo (SIGNED COPIES AVAILABLE!)

A unique book that illustrates daily life in Detroit and Tokyo. Each page is a reflection of social and personal activities in the two cities. In Tokyo, the artist Yasuo Tanaka makes skeleton puppets out of wire, ink and paper. He then takes them into the field and returns with starkly bold and humorous images that mimic daily life bordering on the epic. Detroit artist Dick Cruger finds corresponding landmarks around the city of Detroit using his trademark robot constructions. Both artists use their miniature puppets to draw interesting parallels among life in the urban jungle. A Limited Signed Edition of this book is also available in a handmade slipcase and in a numbered edition of 25 copies for $75. Visit the exhibition BONES in our backroom gallery to see Tanaka’s art and read YASUO TANAKA: PHOTOGRAPHER & PAPER NAPKIN ARTIST

Hype & Soul! Behind the Scenes at Motown (SIGNED COPIES AVAILABLE!)

From being Motown’s first outside hire, to coining the term “The Detroit Sound,” Motown publicity director Al Abrams had a inside vantage point to the greatest pop music machine of the 20th century. Abrams stockpiled a massive collection of photos, promotional fare and internal documents as the label rose from obscurity to international success with artists such as the Supremes, Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye. Abrams’ new book, “Hype & Soul,” assembles hundreds of those rarely seen items for a peek behind the scenes of Motown’s buzz machine. Lavishly illustrated with hundreds of previously unseen photos, press clippings, and memos, Hype & Soul is THE insider’s look into the publicity machine that defined the Motown sound for generations.

Car Guys Vs. Bean Counters: The Battle for the Soul of American Business (SIGNED COPIES AVAILABLE!)

In 2001, General Motors hired Lutz out of retirement with a mandate to save the company by making great cars again. As vice chairman, he launched a war against the penny-pinching number-crunchers who ran the company by the bottom line, and reinstated a focus on creativity, design, and cars and trucks that would satisfy GM customers.

Lutz’s common-sense lessons, combined with a generous helping of fascinating anecdotes, will inspire readers in any industry. As he writes: “It applies in any business. Shoe makers should be run by shoe guys, and software firms by software guys, and supermarkets by supermarket guys. With the advice and support of their bean counters, absolutely, but with the final word going to those who live and breathe the customer experience. Passion and drive for excellence will win over the computer-like, dispassionate, analysis-driven philosophy every time.”

Bill Rauhauser’s 20th Century Photography in Detroit (limited edition with print)

This edition is the signed limited and numbered edition of “Bill Rauhauser’s 20th Century Photography in Detroit” and includes an 8×10″ print of Rauhauser’s photograph of three people on a bench that was included in the “Family of Man” exhibition in 1955. This image was also turned into a life-size bronze sculpture of nudes engaging in sex in the 1990s. The book and print are from an edition of 50 copies. The print is a digital image printed and initialed by Bill Rauhauser and numbered from an edition of 50 copies. The regular $49.95 trade edition of Bill Rauhauser’s 20th Century Photography in Detroit is also still available signed by the photographer and author Mary Dejarlais.

Poetry is Revolution silk screen (SIGNED BY JOHN & LENI SINCLAIR)

A limited edition purple toned silk screen reprint of Trans-Love Energies classic 1967 poster is now available in an edition of 75 copies, on heavy card stock signed and numbered by Leni and John Sinclair!

The title “Poetry is Revolution” became the guiding principle behind the cultural revolution fermenting in the Midwest from the Detroit Artists Workshop , Trans-Love Energies, White Panther Party & Rainbow Peoples Party. Also see:  WHITE PANTHER BUTTONS for sale

Talking Shops: Detroit Commercial Folk Art

“Hand-painted shop signs are among the truest forms of vernacular art.

Speaking an idiomatic language widely understood in their intended community, they are vernacular in the strict sense of the term. Just as pertinent, they communicate in near total independence from fine art society, rarely reflecting its cultural aspirations and pretensions. Yet they can embody the creative qualities fundamental to art — visual expressiveness, aesthetic dimension and craftsmanship. And they are typically made by artists who are self-taught or, if trained, working within a kind of folk tradition.” — SOURCE & COMPLETE REVIEW:  Windows to the vernacular

Julia Reyes Taubman worked in semi-seclusion on her Detroit photography project for nearly seven years and after almost 40,000 photographs she’s assembled her first book with the help of former Detroit Free Press art critic Marsha Miro and book designer Lorraine Wild, a former Detroiter who endowed the book with its visual rhythms and understated focus.

Wild builds up a subtle narrative and pacing structure for the mammoth 488 page book, framing the images into an almost cinematic jigsaw puzzle, from its 1970s’ conceptual-art tone cover with it’s dark burnished industrial-edged spine to its chapter divisions cataloged into East, Central and Western regions. Photographs are often strung together into clusters like a small Greek chorus gathered together by type, size or setting. Page layouts bounce off each other, overlapping and mirroring forms. Some pages extend into one another with their borders continuing the skylines and horizons, areas of pure white acting like rest stops along the way. There is visual music and poetry in large evidence, the brilliance of the design sculpting the project into the category of “book as art object.”

Beginning with the East is a shot of the Detroit river, the true star, life-blood and namesake of the city. It’s a mysterious washed-out photograph, shrouded in fog and drifting off the page like the numinous seascapes of Hiroshi Sugimoto, balanced on the edge of life or death. The book moves forward and westward like a child taking its first steps, slowly, carefully, opening its eyes.

Punctuated by visual mysteries and alien landscapes, (a chair perched in a tree, an odd telephone glued to a tall pole, blue snaky hoses in a forest swamp, dark windowless biker bars, stained crack-house mattresses, gang graffiti and bizarre rubbish piles, homes turned inside-out) the book casts a mythic labyrinthian quality as it passes through gray overcast winter skies, skeleton tree branches and snow covered grass. The quietly surreal, bluesy and lonely nature of Detroit  creates the perfect backdrop and  subject matter for photographic inquiry.

Detroit: 138 Square Miles reads like a visual journey through the scarred backsides and forgotten wastelands of humanity, a spiritual quest through small neighborhoods, infernos, architectural gems, seedy bars and secret locations. Photos from a low-flying airplane splash across the page like exclamation points, revealing powerful rarely seen views of the city, showing in detail the vastness of its rusted arterial and organic nervous system.

In her 1953 non-fiction masterpiece, The Pleasure of Ruins, the late novelist Rose McCauley wrote, “Ruin is always over-stated; it is part of the ruin-drama staged perpetually in the human imagination, half of whose desire is to build up, while the other half smashes and levels to the earth.” This volatile mixture of the sublime and ordinary, the historic and powerless, the built up and smashed, ignites an arresting condition for the photographer and viewer. The imagination is stirred by the contemplation of ruins as we cast ourselves inside the post-apocalyptic future of the present. History is never completely preserved or frozen by photographs. We are left with tracings from the past, fragments that form an ephemeral reality beyond our reach. As observers we are caught inside the poetic conundrum of the ruin and the photograph, a state in constant change, dissolution, romanticism and recovery.

Detroit: 138 Square Miles is equally an autobiography and diary about its maker as it is a love letter to the city. Taubman’s appreciation of modernist buildings and formalism are noted in abundance and are set off alongside her rock ‘n roller aesthetic. The photographer’s fascination with outsiders, criminals and loners connect and syncopate with the outgrown wilderness of the city. The story also unfolds how an artist crafts an identity from their surroundings. The city’s isolation and despair is gently opened up and contrasted by public parks, museums, rock concerts, sports arenas, architectural details and little known neighborhood folk-art curiosities. Taubman’s shared journey is not unlike Baudelaire’s conception of the flânuer: “To be away from home and yet to feel oneself everywhere at home; to see the world, to be at the centre of the world, and yet to remain hidden from the world…”  -not just a crash course on Detroit but also a compendium of a magical kind, a private index with its own unique codes, style and purpose.

Detroit: 138 Square Miles includes a warm reflective introduction by local legend Elmore “Dutch” Leonard. He states, “The reason I’m still here must lie in Julia’s pictures… there is beauty in despair and sometimes a glimmer of hope. ” – and in Jerry Herron’s introductory essay “Living With Detroit”,  he states, “.. the truth of this place is not something you say or take home in an image, but something you do and keep on doing until you become part of the design.” Detroit citizens have an undying passion for their city and its history, reflected in a flood of Detroit-centered books recently published. Generous footnotes next to thumbnail prints in the back of the book fill in details and background history forming a well captioned book-inside-a-book. The printing quality compares with the best of any fine-art photography book published today and is destined to add significantly to the discussion on ruins and the post-apocalyptic cities we inhabit. This latest addition makes a handsome cornerstone to any collection on or about Detroit.

The last photograph in the book is the gravestone of the great bluseman Son House who spent his final years in semi-obscurity working as a janitor in the Old Main building at Wayne State University, his Dry Spell Blues could be a fitting epitaph and accompaniment to the photographs:

“It has been so dry, you can make a powder house out of the world

Well, it has been so dry, you can make a powder house out of the world

And holler money mens, like a rattlesnake in his coil

I throwed up my hands, Lord, and solemnly swore

I have throwed up my hands, Lord, and solemnly swore

Well, ain’t no need of me changing towns, it’s the drought everywhere I go

It’s a dry old spell everywhere I been

Oh, it’s a dry old spell everywhere I been

I believe to my soul this old world is bound to end..” –Dry Spell Blues, Son House

Marjorie Perloff writes: “Among the great modernist poets, Mina Loy was surely the greatest wit, the most sophisticated commentator on the vagaries of love, the one whose brittle and sardonic laughter continues . . . to pursue us.”

Stories and Essays of Mina Loy is the first book-length volume of Mina Loy’s narrative writings and critical work ever published. This volume brings together her short fiction, as well as hybrid works that include modernized fairy tales, a Socratic dialogue, and a ballet. Loy’s narratives address issues such as abortion and poverty, and what she called “the sex war” is an abiding theme throughout. Stories and Essays of Mina Loy also contains dramatic works that parody the bravado and misogyny of Futurism and demonstrate Loy’s early, effective use of absurdist technique. Essays and commentaries on aesthetics, historical events, and religion complete this beguiling collection, cementing Mina Loy’s place as one of the great writers of the twentieth century.

“The collection is divided into three sections, broadly categorized as stories, dramas, and essays. The stories provide the broadest range of Loy’s explorations. The opening tale, “The Agony of the Partition,” is fragmented and poignant, about a failed love affair and its consequential abortion, while “Lady Asterisks” reads like a free love manifesto. “The Stomach” relates the artifice of catering to the male gaze, and likewise the above mentioned “Pazarella” makes fun of the intellectual double standard Loy knew too well of muse and mistress. In “Pazarella,” the eponymous protagonist tries to intellectualize sex and relationships, and “had known all along what she was — woman aware of herself.” But in being so, she tries to intellectualize her affair with Geronimo, who is of the theory that “The secret of woman is that she does not yet exist,” and therefore sets out to formulate her with mind games and sexual demands. – Source; Sara Crangle, Book Slut

The exhibition “Bones” will display the art and vision of Yasuo Tanaka during a consecutive three day opening at the Book Beat gallery/bookstore on Friday, October 21st from 6-8 PM,  Saturday, October 22nd from 5-8 PM and Sunday from 3-5 PM.  The artist will be making “portraits in a wheelchair” during his residency and will have original sculptures, ink napkin drawings, photographs and books for sale. Artist Dick Cruger will also be in attendance and will present their collaboration Parallel Universe, a photographic book correspondence between Tokyo and Detroit.  The Book Beat gallery is located at 26010 Greenfield in Oak Park. Please call 248-968-1190 for more information.

Tokyo artist Yasuo Tanaka (b.1942) is a uniquely  gifted artist that uses bookmaking, design, puppetry, wire sculpture, photography, and ink drawing in fantastic and striking combinations. Tanaka has produced a curious and quietly poetic body of work, a bizarrely stylized skeleton world radiating a simple universal message and philosophy. A surreal, childlike and humorous quality pervades all of Tanaka’s art that presents to us a Borgesian metaphysical vision about eternity, death and life wrapped inside his purely visual reality.

Detroit book artist and sculptor  Dick Cruger, began a friendship with the artist Yasuo Tanaka about 10 years ago. Dick was introduced to Yasuo through the American poet Arthur Barnard who now lives in Tokyo.  Barnard thought the two artists should meet since they both shared a similar aesthetic. Each artist executes their work with technical polish, working in similar areas of storytelling with visual art and sculpture. Together they have recently collaborated on Parallel Universes, book project that combines sites of Detroit and Tokyo told through skeleton and robot figures. The Book Beat gallery will display this body of work and hold the book launch  beginning October 21st.

Tanaka’s small and delicate Tokyo Midnight, is an oblong hand-sewn book of 24 photographs of puppet skeletons posed around nightly urban Tokyo scenes. The title is typewritten on an opaque sheet of paper that covers a small die-cut square on  thick black cardstock  that serves as the book’s cover. The skull of the first skeleton is revealed in a tiny die-cut window as if it is trying to enter another world or  peak into ours… as you open the book there is a dusky scene on the first page, the beginning of a sunrise or sunset. A small moon rests high in the night sky. The skeleton subject looks tired of life and exhausted, its skull bent over drooping, perhaps returning home from a night of drinking, photographing or a long night of witnessing the night action found inside of Midnight Tokyo. We don’t know if the figure is arriving or departing. The ambiguous improvisational nature of Midnight Tokyo describes a multi-level netherworld that is open to many interpretations.

Midnight Tokyo opens up with isolated  single skeletons;  figures alone and lost in thought, one sits at a dinner with a coffee mug watching a clock tick by overhead. Groups of outdoor skeleton’s follow; drinking, buying magazines at a midnight kiosk, a more frenzied group action picks up the pace,  fashionable skeletons are strolling down the street clutching expensive name-brand handbags, a group playing a paddle ball game in the park, a large crowd of skeletons sit watching and cheering on a boxing match of skeletons, a cozy skeleton couple sits on a park bench reading a book as a pair of inexplicable wooden shows sit empty on the brick walkway.  There are scenes of game playing, music performances, a figure photographing roses, a bicyclist in front of a lit up model of the Eiffel Tower, a night ball game, a rainstorm with broken umbrellas,  a boat ride down a river, death figures running and exercising. The last image is large ball, or a sun? or perhaps an entire world of skeletons rising (or setting) over the city as the cross of a church illuminates the urban night sky.

Yasuo beautifully blends in pen-light sketching trails in many of his photos, a technique once made popular in Picasso’s light action drawings from a photographic sequence and film made by Gjon Mili. Tokyo Midnight is a metaphysical book whose power belies its small format and quaint/whimsical qualities. The book is able to use light and darkness in a strong dramatic effect. The work alters our perception of space and depth of field as it subverts our notion of reality, time, life and death. There are no digital effects or photo-shop software used in Yasuo’s work, each image has been carefully thought out and composed beforehand.    

Attaching a long wire handle to his puppet subjects, Tanaka is able to make his skeletons dance and perform activities in synchronicity beside reality. His stage is the rectangular frame of his camera set still on a tripod. Known to travel to Europe with his puppets and tripod camera, Tanaka often sets up among crowds, often preferring to shoot theatrical scenes at nighttime with long open-lens exposures. The photo works make obvious the close connection between the living world and the dead, between the inanimate and the movement of daily life. Tanaka’s shadow worlds are printed in black and white to emphasize the contrasts of light and dark, of white bone against the night. The circular patterns of the book creates a movement of time from indoor personal/private space to public shared space and the madness of crowds. Light shows are an aggressive ongoing element throughout Midnight Tokyo. There are fireworks, lit up skyscrapers, reflections, paper lanterns, neon lights, sun, moon and pen-light drawings. The artist is hyper-conscious of light and composition -and the sublime effect it plays in photography.

Yasuo’s hand-made books are constructed and produced in small editions. He uses fine art printing techniques like continuous tone gravure or hand etchings. The papers and bindings are selected to best reflect on their contents. Tanaka who was once a freelance commercial designer, creates simple black wire figures that he sculpts into 3-dimensional form.He calls these sculpture-drawings, and photographed against a white ground they give an impression of drawings in 3-dimensions..  The skeletons and insect creatures he makes with thin black wire add another dimension to his art. These small sculptural puppets and creatures stand alone as finely crafted miniatures.

Another of Yasuo’s small books is titled One Million One Skeletons. This book of  drawings is spiral bound and contains eight fold-out accordion pages, each folded 6 times and printed on both sides making 96 pages. Each page contains an idea or meditation on the group. There are similar pastimes being examined as in the photographs, yet some sketches also convey a dance or sexual intercourse being performed like instructional positions in a kama sutra book. The swirling ball of skeletons is also present and the message begins to read more chaotic and “group think” then in the fun-loving photography series. One page commands spelling out the words “DON’T THINK TOO MUCH” in bones over a sea of skulls.  It is one of the rare instances that the artist uses words. Is the artist implying thought leads to death or that we should not think about or insert meaning into these drawings – that we should divorce meaning from the visual?  The drawings bring to mind the Day of the Dead rituals of Mexico and the great political skeleton broadsides by Josè Guadalupe Posada. But where Posada infused personalities and the sensational in his grotesques, Yasuo manages a more quiet humorous approach, his cartoons reflect aspects of  Japanese society and the idea of working, standing and playing together as a unit. The bones of Tanaka march together in formal unison creating a repetitive pop landscape of numbness, imprisonment and group interaction.

In one of his rare statements, Tanaka has indicated that these idiosyncratic folk-like drawings are derived from the idea that the skeleton is our one final similarity, the foundation of form contained by all humanity. The skeleton crosses (and eliminates) all borders of nationality, race, class, culture and religion. The skeleton is our shadow and lasting statement on the planet. Tanaka’s skeletons however are far from dead or distant objects. They are animated dead-beings; the bones and raw embodiment of daily life. Tanaka’s miniatures have a similar relationship to the real-life decorative bone tableau’s created in the five chapels at the Cemetery of the Capuchins built in Rome by an anonymous friar in the 1500s.  Tanaka’s skeletons too are seen in everyday activity; eating, playing sports, relaxing, being human. The individual is carefully dissolved by Tanaka’s treatment and what emerges is a kind of homogenous and lively death figure of community activity; a bony image that’s both a single building block (of the architecture of society) and its own universe.  Tanaka conveys both the micro and macro, saying something impregnated with cosmic meaning, yet doing it quietly, in a medium he has created himself and made his own.

The mysterious mazes within Tanaka’s work create a landscape of thinking about  death, an opening  to the idea that death might even hold onto the same drudgery, incarceration, pain, and drunkenness as in life, a message that stands clearly beside the artist’s own statement of unity, fulfillment and joy.

Tanaka’s vision recalls classical Ukiyo-e ghost drawings and their often demented manga offspring. The magical bone writing of Tanaka seem to follow their own codex-like logic as in the mysterious figures found in flattened pre-Columbian Mayan hieroglyphics.  With Tanaka, the repetitive multiplied symbol of death is taken to extremes of cubist abstraction and chaos, suggesting a perpetual struggle or battle with harmony and order. There is also something reminiscent of mobile sculptor Alexander Calder’s miniature circus in the works of Tanaka, each artist content in making self-contained gentle vistas that express life in a transcendent magical way.

For many years Tanaka has been obsessively compiling hundreds, perhaps thousands of his drawings of human skeletons on the surface of delicate paper napkins.  They are labyrinthian objects of order in a private diary – images that hold the memories of past meals and journeys. His drawings contain a magical visual language that echo off again in his photographs. The weightless napkins are generally  about 8 inches square and are unfolded to a surface of about 20″-24″ square. The artist then carefully inks and colors-in images on all quadrants of the translucent square. The initial black outlines act as a border to contain the color. His life’s work fits comfortably inside a small suitcase.

Napkins that are padded underneath the original drawing serve to soak up the ink and watercolors. These formless  “blotter” napkins serve as further canvas for his cartoon/comic ink sketches and offbeat abstractions. He wastes nothing. Tanaka spends countless hours skimming the surface on the thin translucent skins of napkins. A misplaced line or last minute error can completely ruin a work, but the under-napkins may still yield a successful accidental work, a dadaist, surreal strategy of chance. Often the names of restaurants and advertising logos will show through on the napkins reminding us of the temporal and pop nature of these disposable feather-light paper treasures. The Napkin – once a disposable object meant to wipe our faces and clean up stains have been given a new dignity and substance as a container for ideas.

Book Beat will be hosting the first United States exhibition of Yasuo Tanaka’s  artistry.

Sunday, September 19th at 2:00 PM, Book Beat will present an impossibly funky afternoon planned with Mike White author and founding editor of Cashiers du Cinmemart. Mike will present his new anthology–which was years in the making, filled with extremely witty and diverse film writings. Impossibly Funky; A Cashiers du Cinemart Collection is a film collection like no other. Readers of this wise and nitty-gritty book will obtain an education of film-land impossible to find anywhere else on the planet. This book is overflowing with insane delights, kooky interviews and blinding revelations of the universe!

Don’t Miss This!! IMPOSSIBLY FUNKY SUNDAY  –a once-in-a-lifetime afternoon journey of fully mutated movie discussions and gonzo film appreciation made for the true film maniac, but even the common everyday Hollywood Joe-bystander is welcome and will come away with wild tales and juicy gossip that is truly off-the-map.

Harangue for Hollywood! From the blighted urban squalor of Detroit–Paris of the Midwest–came enfant terrible Mike White and his mutant publication, Cashiers du Cinemart. For fourteen years and fifteen issues the writers of Cashiers du Cinemart have provided a treasure trove of writing on film and popular culture.

This book collects the best articles from the fifteen year history of Cashiers du Cinemart magazine with sections dedicated to Quentin Tarantino, Star Wars, Black Shampoo, un-produced screenplays, celebrity interviews, and much more. Everything has been refreshed, polished, and improved for this volume of movie mayhem. Other signing dates available at: http://impossiblefunky.blogspot.com/

We had a chance to talk briefly with author Patrick Rothfuss after his May 2nd book signing held at the Baldwin library.  About 70 of Patrick’s enthusiastic fans came out to hear him speak about The Name of the Wind and its upcoming sequel, The Wise Man’s Fear.

Patrick read a little from his amusing column “The College Survival Guide”, and talked about blogging, writing, teaching, his  family and connecting to the community of fantasy  authors. He also announced the publication of a dark satirical fantasy book, THE ADVENTURES OF THE PRINCESS & MR. WHIFFLE, a title we will have in stock soon.

Of contemporary fantasy writers, Rothfuss recommended three;  Brandon Sanderson,  UK author Joe Abercrombie, and a woman writer currently living and teaching in Chicago; Nnedi Okorafor. Patrick noted he especially liked Okorafor’s ZAHRAH, THE WINDSEEKER, winner of the 2008 Wole Soyinka Prize for literature in Africa.

When asked what world lit classics helped shape his vision, Patrick chose three;  Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, the play Cyrano de Bergerac by Edmond Rostand, and the Memoirs of Giacomo Casonova.

We look forward to another visit with Patrick Rothfuss, hopefully when the sequel is published around March 2011.

Patrick discusses the finer merits of each book jacket to the first edition. Signed copies of the trade paperback edition of The Name of the Wind, are available now at the Book Beat, please call or write soon to hold one.