{"title":"Joel Sternfeld","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eJoel Sternfeld\u003c\/strong\u003e offers a compelling exploration of contemporary landscapes and cultural environments through his evocative photographic works. His books invite readers to contemplate the intersection of place, memory, and identity, revealing nuanced perspectives on urban and rural settings.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eWithin the \u003cem\u003eArts \u0026amp; Culture\u003c\/em\u003e category, Sternfeld’s titles like \u003cem\u003eRome After Rome\u003c\/em\u003e and \u003cem\u003eLandscape as Longing: Queen’s, New York\u003c\/em\u003e provide a meditative journey into the spirit of places transformed by history and human presence, blending visual artistry with thoughtful narrative.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"landscape-as-longing-queens-new-york-by-joel-sternfeld-9783958290327","title":"Landscape as Longing: Queen's, New York","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn 2003, Frank Gohlke and Joel Sternfeld were commissioned to photograph one of the densest concentrations of ethnic diversity in the world, the borough of Queens in New York City. After more than a year of photographing everything from corner bodegas to the borough's boundaries, Gohlke and Sternfeld had not only captured the complicated dynamic that sustains Queens and its myriad communities; they had also evolved a unique theory of landscape photography in which landscape is a visible manifestation of the invisible emotions of its inhabitants.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe collection inherits the strength of each photographer's eye. Gohlke's Queens consists of streets, houses, fences, gardens, parklands, shorelines, and waste spaces, the territory where human arrangement contends endlessly with the forces that undo it: unruly vegetation, weather, rot, decay, and the \"creative destruction\" of a voracious commercial culture. Sternfeld focuses on the indigenous shops, restaurants, mosques and temples that make a walk in Queens feel like a walk in Thailand, India, or Peru – or all of them at once.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eOften tucked into homes or converted factories, these places signify a home country, or perhaps a home country that exists more in the mind than in actuality. In conjunction with an essay by the acclaimed writer Suketu Mehta, this book is a powerful instrument for understanding a landscape that seems to defy interpretation. Gohlke and Sternfeld successfully make the dizzying patchwork of Queens accessible and visible.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eLandscape as Longing: Queen's, New York\u003c\/em\u003e is more than a photographic study; it is a testament to the vibrant diversity and intricate social fabric of one of New York City's most fascinating boroughs.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Thames and Hudson (Australia) Pty Ltd","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47431410352364,"sku":"9783958290327","price":130.0,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/9783958290327.jpg?v=1774557819"},{"product_id":"joel-sternfeld-rome-after-rome-by-joel-sternfeld-9783958292635","title":"Joel Sternfeld: Rome After Rome","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn his 1992 book \u003cem\u003eCampagna Romana. The Countryside of Ancient Rome\u003c\/em\u003e, Joel Sternfeld focused on the ruins of grand structures with a clear warning: great civilisations fall, ours may too. Now in \u003cem\u003eRome After Rome\u003c\/em\u003e, containing images from the previous book as well as numerous unpublished pictures, Sternfeld's questions multiply: who are these modern Romans? What is their relationship to the splendour that was? What is the nature of sullied modernity in relation to the Arcadian ideal? Is there, at this late moment, any chance for Utopia?\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe Campagna, the countryside south and east of Rome, occupies a special place in Roman—and human history. With the rise of Ancient Rome, this once polluted, malarial landscape was restored by emperors and thrived with some 20 towns and numerous wealthy villas on the rolling plains among the mighty aqueducts that fed water to Rome. After the city fell, the Campagna once again became desolate and dangerous. The gloomy tombs, broken homes and aqueducts sat in a kind of no man's land for over 1,000 years.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eTo this landscape came the painters: Durer, Lorrain, Poussin, and later, Corot, Turner, and Americans such as Thomas Cole. In the ruins, they sought the origins of Rome's greatness and the meaning of her fall. Later, they depicted a place where Roman gods cavorted and mankind lived in a golden age, an Arcadia. Central Rome was rebuilt with Baroque apartments hiding the past: in the Campagna, the past was visible and all imaginings possible.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eSternfeld juxtaposes the ruins of a powerful, ancient civilisation with the new construction and the debris of our own time. Avoiding obvious contrasts, eschewing heavy-handed irony, this contemporary artist draws our attention to both despoliation and lasting beauty; he suggests many reasons for despair, yet he also has something to say about the nobility of the human spirit.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eTheodore E. Stebbins Jr.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Thames and Hudson (Australia) Pty Ltd","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47461100454124,"sku":"9783958292635","price":230.0,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/9783958292635-joel-sternfeld-rome-after-rome.jpg?v=1774958032"}],"url":"https:\/\/bookhero.co.nz\/collections\/joel-sternfeld.oembed","provider":"Book Hero","version":"1.0","type":"link"}