Lee Frielander - Nudes - 1991

The nude is at the center of Western art. Since the dawn of photography, it has attracted photographers, many of whom have imitated the forms and poses depicted by painters. There are few cases where a photographer has abandoned derivative styles to allow the viewer to see the body in a completely new way. This happened in America with Edward Weston’s work and in Britain with Bill Brandt's. Now it happens in Lee Friedlander’s photographs. For 15 years he worked with several models and little of his work has been seen. The photographs are at once deeply intimate and coldly detached. His perspectives, often surprising, are balanced by the banal backgrounds of daily life, by the true domestic interiors of the models. This book is dedicated to Friedlander’s work.