Signed Lewis Baltz - San Quentin Point - 1986

Rare, signed first edition on the title page by Lewis Baltz (1945 – 2014), almost imposible to find online in a signed copy, original edition published in France. 136 pages and 58 full-page photographic plates printed full-bleed on recto only, text in English, French and German by Mark Haworth-Booth. Very handsome black toiled binding, with the SQP title embossed in a subtle tone-on-tone on the cover and the full title on the back, the first dust jacket illustrated but without a title as the title appears thanks to a second transparent plastic jacket which is titled. All in excellent condition.

Nota bene: This edition published by Editions de la Différence was printed with the same printing as the Aperture edition, both printed in Germany at the same moment on July 21, 1986 (both editions are trilingual and only the title page with the editor’s name changes). Indeed, as Parr & Badger note, “Baltz and Gossage taught their craft in Berlin and were exposed there; their books published by Aperture were even edited and printed in Germany” (Photobook vol. II p. 14 and p. 55).

The photographs gathered by Lewis Baltz at San Quentin Point depict empty and abandoned zones, littered with debris and rubbish. This work presents an uncompromising tableau of the environmental consequences of industrial development and consumer society. In contrast to the sublime, these entropic spaces echo scientific progress.

Lewis Baltz confides to us, “I was born, said Lewis Baltz, in a region whose urbanization was the fastest in the world, Southern California, in the postwar period. Things were changing before our eyes, it was astonishing. A world was being born, perhaps not a very pleasant world, but a world that was this new American environment, homogenized, that spread across the country, and would soon be exported everywhere… ”

“What is remarkable again is the photographer’s interest in abandoned soils, or more exactly ‘just abandoned,’ when vegetation has not yet fully reestablished itself and there remain even some fragments of the space formerly occupied

Ultimately Baltz shows us sites ‘emptied’ by man; he lets us look at them while subtly suggesting that nature never finishes anything and that it remains capable of rebuilding the destroyed landscape” [unless it becomes a built space] (https://zonefranche.media/question-paysage-vue-lewis-baltz-3627)

Book from my personal collection, in excellent condition with only very minor wear to the edge of the paper dust jacket (see photo), book kept with the greatest care. Very efficient protected shipping and internationally trackable mail guaranteed. If purchasing multiple items, possible combined shipping with a refund of any excess postage paid via Paypal.

1,350 kg excluding packaging