William Eggleston's Guide

William Eggleston's Guide by William Eggleston. 2005 reprint of the second edition. Medium format hardback in fine condition. Signed by William Eggleston to title page. No markings. Please see pictures. PayPal accepted, any questions please get in touch.

About William Eggleston's Guide

William Eggleston's Guide was the first one-man show of colour photographs ever presented at The Museum of Modern Art, New York. As well as this it was the Museum's first publication of colour photography. The reception was divided and passionate. The book and show forced the art world to deal with colour photography, a medium barely taken seriously at the time. As well as, with the vernacular content of a body of photographs that could have been but definitely weren't some average person's Instamatic pictures from the family album. So, these photographs heralded a new mastery of the use of colour as an integral element of photographic composition. Bound in a textured cover inset with a photograph of a tricycle and stamped with yearbook style gold lettering, the Guide contained 48 images edited down from 375 shot between 1969 and 1971 and displayed a casual, super refined look at the world around. Here are people, landscapes and odd little moments in and around Eggleston's home town of Memphis. An anonymous woman in a loudly patterned dress and cat's eye glasses sitting, left leg slightly raised, on an equally loud outdoor sofa; a coal fired barbecue shooting up in flames, framed by a shiny silver tricycle; the curves of a gleaming black car fender, and someone's torso; a tiny, grey haired lady in a faded, flowered housecoat, standing expectant, and dwarfed in the huge dark doorway of a mint green room whose only visible furniture is a shaded lamp on an end table.

About William Eggleston

Eggleston (b 1939) is an American photographer. Due to his attention to the banal, his colour photographs record everyday subject matter. Such as motel rooms and storefronts, in eccentric, refined compositions. So, each detail is important, potentially carrying beauty and mystery. As a result of his pioneering work, he became the main catalyst for New American Color Photography. Therefore, Eggleston is largely credited with validating colour photography as a fine art form.

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