Photographer (and Brooklynite) Mark Borthwick features some of his dreamy, hazy photographs, with an emphasis on nature and ecology, in The Heart Land, which one reviewer calls “a perfect book to flip through, to bring you back to the lazy summer days, just as the actual weather upon us turns cold.” Borthwick will perform in-store on 12/17
From his teens until his death, the maps George Washington drew and purchased were always central to his work. After his death, many of the most important maps he had acquired were bound into an atlas. The atlas remained in his family for almost a century before it was sold and eventually ended up at Yale University’s Sterling Memorial Library. Inspired by these remarkable maps, historian Barnet Schecter has crafted a unique portrait of our first Founding Father, placing the reader at the scenes of his early career as a surveyor, his dramatic exploits in the French and Indian War (his altercation with the French is credited as the war’s spark), his struggles throughout the American Revolution as he outmaneuvered the far more powerful British army, his diplomacy as president, and his shaping of the new republic. George Washington’s America allows readers to visualize history through Washington’s eyes, and sheds fresh light on the man and his times.
From Here to There: Alec Soth’s America is the first exhibition catalogue to feature the full spectrum of the work of Soth, one of the most interesting voices in contemporary photography, whose compelling images of everyday America form powerful narrative vignettes. Featuring more than 100 of the artist’s photographs made over the past 15 years, the book includes new critical essays which offer context on the artist’s working process, the photo-historical tradition behind his practice and reflections on his latest series of works. Alec Soth was born in 1969 and raised in Minnesota, where he continues to live and work.
Paul Strand in Mexico tells the story of the photographer’s journeys through Mexico in the early 1930s. In search of a fresh start, Strand traveled to Mexico City in late 1932 at the invitation of Carlos Chavez, the eminent Mexican composer and conductor. The work he created during this key period reflects a time of intense productivity, creative renewal, and the evolution of Strand’s foundational idea of the “collective portrait,” in which he depicted a region through photographs of individuals, still lifes and studies of architecture and religious subjects.
If the materials make the artist, then the right cooking toys can make the chef. Beyond the simple act of preparing food, cooking for others is a journey of personal creation that expresses one’s own individualism through an edible art form, and Toys for Chefs by Patrice Farameh is an attractive guide to that pursuit. Chefs are as passionate about using the best tools for their craft as they are about the perfect ingredients used in their cuisine.
On a more practical note, What to Cook and How to Cook It is the ultimate cookbook for beginners, showing how to cook easy, delicious meals for every day of the week. With a winning combination of clear step-by step-photographs, and authoritative, foolproof recipes, it takes 100 favorite everyday dishes and guides the reader through every step of the cooking process with recipes that absolutely anyone can follow..
If you’re an atheist, you don’t believe in the three wise men, so this Christmas, we bring you not three, but 42 wise men and women, bearing gifts of comedy, science, philosophy, the arts, and knowledge. What does it feel like to be born on Christmas day? How can you most effectively use lights to make your house visible from space? And where can you listen to the echoes of the Big Bang on Dec. 25? The Atheist’s Guide to Christmas answers all these questions and more.