Signed; Massimo Vitali - Natural habitats - 2010

Rare copy of the original 2010 edition, exceptionally signed on the title page by Massimo Vitali (born 1944). Not to be confused with the 2011 reissue! 144 pages and 84 photographs published mostly in full-page, large-format images. Yellow cloth binding with the title embossed on the spine in pale blue and an illustrated dust jacket. In excellent condition, as new.

A superficial approach may consider Massimo Vitali the photographer of beaches exclusively, whereas his subject is much broader: after starting his career as a photojournalist and director of photography, Vitali from 1993 engages in a kind of inventory of human behaviors in public leisure spaces: the beach, nightclubs, public gardens and other highly frequented entertainment or tourist venues become his preferred field of investigation. Thanks to the use of a large-format camera, Vitali reinvents the pictorial genre of the “landscape with figures.”

In this volume, Massimo Vitali thus presents vacationers who settle in undeveloped natural spaces at the edge of the sea or in riverbed or torrent areas. He also broadens his scope to tourist sites such as the ruins of Matera in Italy or Ephesus in Lebanon or the famous stairs of the Trinità dei Monti in Rome or the Piazza of the Basilica San Marco in Venice.

Vitali’s photographs concentrate, in a single frame, the near and the far, figures captured in the immediacy of action or inaction that force the viewer’s gaze to the most attentive observation. These photos, immense and vivid, resemble, with this mass of people, bustling images, on which our eyes can wander to discover, each time, details and new faces. (Bellefeuille Gallery site, Montreal)

This volume of Natural Habitats presents the entire photographic research of Massimo Vitali from 2004 to 2009. This volume is the second in an imposing trilogy that began with the volume Landscape with Figures published in 2004 and will continue until 2019 with the volume Entering a New World published in 2019, also from Steidl.

Book from my personal collection, in excellent condition, as new; copy kept with the greatest care. Very effectively protected shipping and international tracking guaranteed. In case of multiple purchases, there is the possibility of grouped shipping with reimbursement of excess postage paid via PayPal.

1.9 kg