Books in Heat

AN AMERICAN LENS: Scenes from Alfred Stieglitz’s New York Secession
by Jay Bochner (MIT Press).

We’re not exactly bereft of books about this very important---and for us now, perhaps very romantic period---in the arts, the early 20th century in Europe and America. But after so many tomes (as well as exhibits) about the painters, poets, musicians, dancers and pioneer filmmakers, particularly in Europe, it’s a little surprising to realize we haven’t had much about a man who was the vital link between Europe and the emerging Americans, and who put his stamp on the whole century with the work he introduced and championed, and produced.

Perhaps it has something to do with Alfred Stieglitz being a photographer, the most neglected art of that period. Yet as Jay Bochner demonstrates in this fascinating book, Stieglitz may be our invisible man, but he was that era’s indispensable man.

MORE HERE