Opening today in The Cooley Gallery at Reed College in Portland, Oregon is the U.S. debut of “New and Used” an exhibit of photographs by Marc Joseph. Joseph traveled across America photographing “the spaces and objects of independent book and record stores”. Steidl has recently published these photos in the book version of “New and Used”. The book is accompanied by “a set of essays, short, fiction, and poetry by contemporary writers and musicians” who relate their own ” used and new experience”. Contributors include Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth fame, Eileen Myles, Jonathan Lethem, Shelley Jackson and Stephanie Snyder, who is also curating the exhibit. The image above is entitled “Sorted” and was taken inside the Strand Book Store in New York City.
Excellent LA Times Review of the book by Portland based Karri Higgins here
Village Voice Review of the book here
There is also a blog that has recently hit the scene that is trying to create a visual document of independent book shops called The Independent Bookstore Gallery. Their mission is to “strive to be an invaluable resource for the book buying public by giving the reader/traveler the option of viewing the bookshop before visiting the specific area”.
More than a travel resource this project has the seeds of a visual archive of a vanishing breed. This almost has a non-profit feel to it. We need a Candida Hofer type to get some grant money and run around the country taking pictures of all the independent book shops.
The other challenge I see is that this sounds more like a Flickr group. In fact there are various Flickr groups committed to bookshops and book culture. There is one called Second Hand Bookshops that claims 115 members and a group called Bookshelves which has over 300 photos posted. I think there is a middle ground here somewhere, user generated images complemented by blog driven content.
From overthemoon via Flickr