Joel Meyerowitz is republishing his photograph ebook Wild Flowers
Wild Flowers was first published in 1983 and was Meyerowitz's third photo book. Cape Light and St. Louis & the Arch. Taken with a view camera, the images in these projects are deserted and show beautiful, almost architectural landscapes that play with light and space.
In contrast, Wild Flowers is full of human interaction and the photographer explores "the rituals and follies of life" in an abundance of saturated colors. The updated photo book published by Damiani is now in a larger format and includes new and previously unpublished images.
All pictures: wild flowers, © Joel Meyerowitz
The famous photographer sees the world as his "visual garden" and this issue of Wild Flowers features images spanning Meyerowitz's entire career from the 1960s to 2020. From street photography to still lifes, portraits to landscapes and more, the minor character in all of these images are flowers, and it's what holds them all together.
The photographer first got the idea when he saw the recurring flower motif in his street photography in his archive. For Meyerowitz, these images capture the beauty of everyday life and challenge the clichéd image of flowers by capturing them in different contexts and supporting the people who appear in the images.
From a carnation tied to a lapel on a windy wedding day to a man on a unicycle carrying a tower of paper flowers, the photographs are classic Meyerowitz in that they capture the humor, pathos, and intrigues of everyday life .
Meyerowitz & # 39; wife and colleague Maggie Barrett wrote the foreword for this edition of the book and compares the photographer with a gardener who stands in the landscape and waits for moments that he can encourage. In addition to his talents as a photographer, Wild Flowers also underscores Meyerowitz's talent as an editor and his instinct to find connections between seemingly different images and to give them a deeper meaning by weaving them together.
"As each of these images perpetuates the moment, the subject reveals the ephemeral, transitory nature of existence," writes Barrett.
"Like all well-tended gardens, Wild Flowers is a book that you can wander through again and again and discover something new every time."
Joel Meyerowitz Wild flowers is published by Damiani and is now available as a hardcover book and as a special Collector & # 39; s Edition. joelmeyerowitz.com