THE SCENIC DAGUERREOTYPE: ROMANTICISM AND EARLY PHOTOGRAPHY

Iowa City, IA: University Of Iowa Press, 1995. First Edition. First Printing.. Hardcover. Fine/Fine Dust Jacket.. Iowa City, IA: University Of Iowa Press, 1995. Hardcover. Fine/Fine. First Edition/First Printing. 222 pages. Landmark monograph on subject. One of the most important photography books ever published in our time. The First Hardcover Edition. Precedes and should not be confused with all other subsequent editions. Published in a small and limited first print run as a hardcover original only and as part of the now-classic series on the early history of photography by the Iowa University Press. The First Edition is now scarce. An austerely elegant production by University of Iowa Press: Oversize-volume format. Maroon linen cloth boards with metallic-silver titles embossed on spine, as issued. Text by John Wood. Foreword by John R. Stilgoe. Photographs by various contributors. Printed on archival, acid-free stock paper in the United States to the highest standards. In pictorial DJ with titles on the cover and spine, as issued. Presents John Wood's "The Scenic Daguerreotype". The best book on its subject, whose devotee and guiding light is the poet, literary critic, and photography scholar John Wood. "Imagine a gold and mercury image on a layer of silver bonded to copper, an all-metal photographic process that poisoned some its practitioners. Imagine an era long before a surfeit of images began to dull the viewer, when a visual reality, not a virtual one, captivated the imagination. The daguerreotype process is not only one of the great artistic vehicles for rendering the human face, but an equally potent and elegant means of rendering a scenic image. The author has assembled the largest collection of daguerreotypes ever seen in book form, including Jean-Louis-Baptiste Gros' masterful studies of the Acropolis and the Seine and Joseph Wilhelm Pero's striking images of Lubeck, Germany" (Publisher's blurb). An absolute "must-have" title for John Wood and photography book collectors. This copy is very prominently, neatly, and beautifully signed and inscribed in black ink-pen by the author: "For Martha, with affection, John Wood". It is signed directly on the page itself, not on a tipped-in page. The recipient, Martha Schneider, who is named, is one of the most important figures in contemporary art and photography. This title is a contemporary photography classic. As far as we know, this is the only such signed and inscribed copy of the First Hardcover Edition/First Printing available online and is in especially fine condition: Clean, crisp, and bright. Please note: Copies available online have serious flaws, are subsequent printings, or are remainder-marked. This is surely an accessible and lovely alternative. A rare signed copy thus. 100 plates. Some of the finest photographs we will ever see, scrutinized with love, passion, and measure by one of the finest photography historian/scholars of our time. A fine copy. (SEE ALSO OTHER JOHN WOOD TITLES IN OUR CATALOG). ISBN 0877455112.