Joel Meyerowitz

After the destruction of the World Trade Center in New York on September 11th 2001, the world-renowned photographer Joel Meyerowitz felt compelled to visit the site. In his own words, he was 'overcome by a deep impulse to help, to save, to soothe, but, being far away, there was nothing I could do. On his return, Meyerowitz soon made his way to the scene where, upon raising his camera, he was reminded by a police officer that this was a crime scene and that no photographs were allowed. Meyerowitz duly left the scene but within a few blocks the officer's reminder had turned into consciousness. To Meyerowitz, 'no photographs meant no history' and he decided at that moment to find a way in and make an archive for the City of New York. Within days, he had established strong links with many of the firefighters, policemen and construction workers contributing to the clean up. With their assistance he became the only photographer to be granted unimpeded access to Ground Zero. Once there, he systematically began to document the wreckage followed by the necessary demolition, excavation and removal of tens of thousands of tonnes of debris that would transform the site from one of total devastation to level ground. Soon after, the Museum of the City of New York officially engaged Meyerowitz to create an archive of the destruction and recovery at Ground Zero. The 9/11 Photographic Archive numbers in excess of 5,000 images and will become part of the permanent collections of the Museum of the City of New York. Meyerowitz takes a meditative stance toward the work and workers at Ground Zero, methodically recording the painful work of rescue, recovery, demolition and excavation. His pictures succinctly convey the magnitude of the destruction and loss and the heroic nature of the response. The images included here are a combination of prints from a large format camera, which allows for the greater detail, and standard 35mm, a format which provided Meyerowitz with the freedom to move easily around the site and capture each moment as it happened. The remarkable pictures in the archive visually relate the catastrophic destruction of the 9/11 attacks and the physical and human dimensions of the recovery effort. The aim of this book is to provide record of the extraordinary extent of the World Trade Center attacks and to documents the recovery efforts. The book will serve as both a poignant elegy to those that lost their lives and as a celebration of the tireless determination of those left behind to reclaim and rebuild the area known as 'Ground Zero'. Twenty eight of the images in from the archive were displayed in New York and then in over fifty cities around the world in a travelling exhibition entitled After September 11: Images from Ground Zero.

Aimed at children between the ages of eight and twelve, "Seeing Things" is a wonderful introduction to photography that asks how photographers transform ordinary things into meaningful moments. In this book, acclaimed and beloved photographer Joel Meyerowitz takes readers on a journey through the power and magic of photography: its abilities to freeze time, tell a story, combine several layers into one frame and record life's fleeting and beautiful moments. The book features the work of masters such as William Eggleston, Mary Ellen Mark, Helen Levitt and Walker Evans, among many others. Each picture is accompanied by a short commentary, encouraging readers to look closely and use their imagination to understand key ideas in photography such as light, gesture, composition-and, ultimately, how there is wonder all around us when viewed through the lens. Joel Meyerowitz (born 1938) is an award-winning photographer whose work has appeared in over 350 exhibitions in museums and galleries around the world. He is a two-time Guggenheim Fellow, a recipient of both National Endowment for the Arts and National Endowment for the Humanities awards and a recipient of the Deutscher Fotobuchpreis. He has published over 15 books and divides his time between New York and Italy.

In this book, the authors explore and discuss the development of one of the most interesting and dynamic of photographic genres. Hailed as a landmark work when it was first published in 1994, Bystander is widely regarded by street photographers as the ‘bible’ of street photography. It covers an incredible array of talent, from the unknowns of the late 19th century to the acknowledged masters of the 20th, such as Atget, Stieglitz, Strand, Cartier-Bresson, Brassai, Kertesz, Frank, Arbus, Winogrand and Levitt to name just a few. In this new and fully revised edition, the story of street photography is brought up to date with a re-evaluation of some historical material, the inclusion of more contemporary photographers and a discussion of the ongoing rise of digital photography.

Where I Find Myself is the first major single book retrospective of one of America's leading photographers. As the title indicates, it is organized in inverse chronological order and spans the photographer's whole career to date. It covers all of Meyerowitz's great projects: his work inspired by the artist Morandi, his work on trees, his exclusive coverage of Ground Zero, his trips in the footsteps of Robert Frank across the US, his experiments comparing colour and black and white pictures, and of course his iconic street photography work. The text is all by Joel Meyerowitz himself and the book coincides with a major retrospective show in Berlin

This new and expanded edition of Joel Meyerowitz's widely acclaimed photobook, Wild Flowers - now, in a larger format, features new and unpublished images. For nearly forty years Joel Meyerowitz has tended his visual garden in the streets and parks and cities he has visited or lived in. He goes out into the streets open-eyed and passionate, carrying a machine which is perfectly suited to the task of taking it all in. The Leica, as quick as the flick of an eyelash, effortlessly interrupts time, stopping and holding it forever. These walks gave shape to new territory for him, which he began to think of as a garden that reflected the variety of his observations. Then, one day, while editing, Meyerowitz stumbled upon a small group of these flower photographs which he had gathered unknowingly. He began to believe that this innocent premise might be enough to tie together many of his other photographic concerns under the nominal subject of 'flowers,' which, given the surprises of city life, he viewed as flowers gone somewhat berserk-and so Wild Flowers was born.

The 'Masters of Photography' series is a new approach to photography how-to. Each volume is dedicated to the work of one key photographer who, through a series of bite-sized lessons and ideas, tells you everything you always wanted to know about their approach to taking photographs. From their influences, ideas and experiences, to tech tips and best shots. The series begins with Joel Meyerowitz, who will teach you, among other essentials: how to use a camera to reclaim the streets as your own, why you need to watch the world always with a sense of possibility, how to set your subjects at ease, and the importance of being playful and of finding a lens that suits your personality. Praise for Joel Meyerowitz's retrospective, Where I Find Myself: "So let me say it plainly: Joel Meyerowitz's Where I Find Myself is a compelling, wonderful, deeply pleasing collection of an essential photographer's work. [it] is a necessary book. Necessary because of its size and scope. Necessary because of the way it holds the aesthetic of the artist in the air." LensCulture "More than just a career retrospective, Meyerowitz's book is a personal celebration of photography as an art form." Publishers Weekly "After over half a century of making pictures, Meyerowitz is noted as one of the most influential photographers living today. A new book titled Joel Meyerowitz's Where I Find Myself brings together his tremendous archive to create a portrait of not only America during the 20th and early 21st centuries, but also a prolific artist with a lifetime of groundbreaking work." BuzzFeed

It was in 1978, during my first summer of making portraits while using an 8x10 inch large format camera, that I found myself drawn to photographing redheads. I have often been asked; 'why redheads,' and I've often felt it was because in summer redheads seem to bloom in the sun more gloriously than the rest of us. But it also might have been my living far out on the tip of Cape Cod, surrounded by all the blue light of sea and sky, which made me pay more attention to the flamboyant qualities of redheads. Their hair and the exotic markings of their skin in sunlight became even rosier and more astonishing in that blue atmosphere. Redheads, like film itself, are transformed by sunlight. It seems natural to me now that I would have paid attention to this new phenomenon as it appeared within the larger subject of the Cape itself. After making more than 50 portraits that first month, in which at least 30 were of redheads, I understood that this was an impulse to be taken seriously. I ran an ad in the local paper, the Provincetown Advocate: "REMARKABLE PEOPLE! If you are a redhead or know someone who is, I'd like to make your portrait, call...." They began coming to my deck, bringing with them their courage and their shyness, their curiosity and their dreams, and they shared their stories of what it was like to be a redhead. They spoke of the painful remembrances of childhood, the violations of privacy and name calling-"Hey, red," "freckle face," "carrot head." They also shared with me their sense of personal victory at having overcome this early, unwanted celebrity, and how like giants or dwarfs or athletes they had finally grown into their specialness and by surviving had been ennobled by it. You could say that they had been baptized by their own fire, and that their shared experience had formed a "blood knot" among them. I had begun making portraits with the intention of photographing ordinary people. But redheads are both ordinary and special. Their slender slice of the genetic pie accounts for only 2 or 3 percent of the world's population. As different as redheads are in terms of nationality and religion, they often give the appearance of a strong familial connection.

Joel Meyerowitz is one of the pioneers of color photography, as well as an essential reference figure for street photography, large-format photography, and portraits. The Pleasure of Seeing is his first biography, the book offers a look behind the scenes of the life and career of one of America's photographic living legends. In conversation with historian and photographer Lorenzo Braca, Meyerowitz speaks vividly about his beginnings, studying art history, meeting Robert Frank, photographing on the streets of New York City with Tony Ray-Jones and Garry Winogrand, traveling extensively across America and Europe, learning from John Szarkowski, director of photography at MoMA, working on numerous exhibitions and publications, photographing at Ground Zero in 2001 and 2002, and about the most recent still lifes and self-portraits projects. The book contains over one hundred pictures, including Joel's most iconic photographs as well as new and previously unpublished material. This comprehensive visual biography testifies to the author's continuing evolution throughout the six decades of his career and discusses his work in relation to his personal life, to the history of photography, and to the incessant transformation of the medium. Meyerowitz reveals anecdotes, personal memories, and the story behind many of his famous photographs.