Wolfgang Tillmans
These two new works are united by the fact that each of the twentysomething artists earned a place in this fall's round-up of best new photographers at the Museum of Modern Art, New York. In a book devoid of text (even the copyright information is on the back cover), Billingham presents an extended album of his family's life in the projects near Birmingham, England. The brutally frank snapshots center on Ray, Richard's alcholic father, Liz, his chainsmoking mother, and his brother Jason. Mostly disturbing yet sometimes beautiful, the haunting images seem to carry the burden of documentation, declaring their existence to be a necessary proof. Tillmans, a German photographer who has lived and worked in Hamburg, London, and New York intermingles without distinction his art images and his fashion and portrait work for magazines. This catalog for a one person show at the Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg collects a diverse selection of his images. Sequenced by Tillmans, the catalog places a special emphasis on the landscapes and still lifes that have often been overlooked by critics who have labeled Tillmans the documentarian of an urban Generation X. The three short essays offer some of the most cogent writing on the photographer to date. Both books belong in larger libraries collecting contemporary artists' works.?Eric Bryant, "Library Journal"Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.