Edited with text by Anna Tellgren. Foreword by Daniel Birnbaum, Ann-Sofie Noring. Introduction by Lena Esseling. Text by Anna-Karin Palm, George Woodman.
On Being an Angel takes its title from a caption the artist inscribed on two of her photographs—self-portraits with her head thrust back and her chest thrust forward. Typical of Woodman’s work in the way they cast the female body as simultaneously physical and immaterial, these photographs and the evocative title they share are apt choices to encapsulate the work of an artist whose legacy has been unavoidably colored by her tragic personal biography and her death, at age 22, by suicide. In less than a decade, Woodman produced a fascinating body of work—in black and white and in color—exploring gender, representation, sexuality and the body through the photographing of her own body and those of her friends. Since her death, Woodman’s influence continues to grow: her work has been the subject of numerous in-depth studies and exhibitions in recent years, and her photographs have inspired artists all over the world. Published to accompany a travelling exhibition of Woodman’s work, Francesca Woodman: On Being an Angel offers a comprehensive overview of Woodman’s oeuvre, organized chronologically, with texts by Anna Tellgren, Anna-Karin Palm and the artist’s father, George Woodman. Francesca Woodman (1958–81) was born in Denver, Colorado, to an artistic family and began experimenting with photography as a teenager. In 1975 she attended the Rhode Island School of Design, and in 1979 she moved to New York to attempt to build a career in photography. Woodman’s working career was intense but brief, cut short by her death in 1981.
"Untitled, New York," 1979, is reproduced from Francesca Woodman: On Being an Angel.
PRAISE AND REVIEWS
Vogue.com
Rebecca Bengal
What this reproduction of her photographs offers is a personal experience with the work, visceral and dynamic and enigmatic and passionate, and you also suspect, deeply ironic and funny.
StyleZeitgeist
Eugene Rabkin
[Woodman] has left a rich body of work that consists of photographs that could easily be mundane in the hands of a lesser artist, but in Woodman’s hands become enigmatic.
STATUS: Out of stock
Temporarily out of stock pending additional inventory.
"Francesca Woodman’s photographs are the work of a young woman," Anna-Karin Palm writes in Koenig Books and Moderna Museet's beautifully-designed, unusually intimate-feeling 232-page survey, Francesca Woodman: On Being an Angel. "There are some things a young person sees more clearly, when she hasn’t yet grown accustomed to compromise and gray areas. Everything is more apparent, more sharply lit, feelings carved from the flesh. The sincere compass needles of questions through the body, those truly large questions that demand courage, intelligence, and an awakened presence in order to be asked. Fundamental research questions." Featured image is "Untitled, New York" (1979). continue to blog
"The work of Francesca Woodman lies in the realm of still photography," Woodman's father, George Woodman, writes in the beautifully scaled and somehow tactile new release, On Being an Angel. "Nevertheless, her images using the formal device of a zigzag are anything but still. They are restless pictures filled with motion. The viewer’s glance is never permitted to halt and is urged onward to embrace sequences, consider episodes, submit to rhythms, and confront changes of identities. These images are less tied to the logic of 'presentation,' which is the core of still photography, and more the result of a choreography of images, an artful control of the irrepressible motion within them." Featured image is "Untitled, New York" (1979). continue to blog
March 10-13, ARTBOOK | D.A.P. presents key course adoption titles, as well as new and classic monographs and photobooks, influential surveys and exhibition catalogs, and an assortment of key photographers' writings at the Society for Photographic Education National Conference. Visit us in Booth 38! continue to blog
FORMAT: Hbk, 6.75 x 9 in. / 232 pgs / 105 color. LIST PRICE: U.S. $39.95 LIST PRICE: CANADA $53.95 ISBN: 9783863357504 PUBLISHER: Koenig Books AVAILABLE: 1/26/2016 DISTRIBUTION: D.A.P. RETAILER DISC: TRADE PUBLISHING STATUS: Active AVAILABILITY: Out of stock TERRITORY: NA LA ASIA AU/NZ AFR
Published by Koenig Books. Edited with text by Anna Tellgren. Foreword by Daniel Birnbaum, Ann-Sofie Noring. Introduction by Lena Esseling. Text by Anna-Karin Palm, George Woodman.
On Being an Angel takes its title from a caption the artist inscribed on two of her photographs—self-portraits with her head thrust back and her chest thrust forward. Typical of Woodman’s work in the way they cast the female body as simultaneously physical and immaterial, these photographs and the evocative title they share are apt choices to encapsulate the work of an artist whose legacy has been unavoidably colored by her tragic personal biography and her death, at age 22, by suicide. In less than a decade, Woodman produced a fascinating body of work—in black and white and in color—exploring gender, representation, sexuality and the body through the photographing of her own body and those of her friends. Since her death, Woodman’s influence continues to grow: her work has been the subject of numerous in-depth studies and exhibitions in recent years, and her photographs have inspired artists all over the world. Published to accompany a travelling exhibition of Woodman’s work, Francesca Woodman: On Being an Angel offers a comprehensive overview of Woodman’s oeuvre, organized chronologically, with texts by Anna Tellgren, Anna-Karin Palm and the artist’s father, George Woodman.
Francesca Woodman (1958–81) was born in Denver, Colorado, to an artistic family and began experimenting with photography as a teenager. In 1975 she attended the Rhode Island School of Design, and in 1979 she moved to New York to attempt to build a career in photography. Woodman’s working career was intense but brief, cut short by her death in 1981.
