In The Beginning
Diane Arbus
Metropolitan Museum of Art
English
Edited by Jeff L. Rosenheim
Hardcover
272 pages
240 × 290 mm
2016
ISBN 9781588395955
Diane Arbus (1923–1971) is one of the most distinctive and provocative artists of the twentieth century. Her photographs of children and eccentrics, couples and circus performers, female impersonators and nudists, are among the most recognisable images of our time. This book is the definitive study of the artist’s first seven years of work, from 1956 to 1962. Drawn primarily from the rich holdings of the Metropolitan Museum’s Diane Arbus Archive—a remarkable treasury of photographs, negatives, appointment books, notebooks, and correspondence—it is an essential contribution to our understanding of Arbus and her oeuvre.
Diane Arbus: In The Beginning showcases over 100 of the artist’s early photographs, more than half of which are published here for the first time. The book provides a crucial, in-depth presentation of the artist’s genesis, showing Arbus as she developed her evocative and often haunting imagery. The photographs featured in this handsome volume reveal an artist defining her style, honing her subject matter, and in full possession of the many gifts for which she is now recognised the world over.“
About the Artist
Diane Arbus is one of the most original and influential photographers of the twentieth century. She studied photography with Berenice Abbott, Alexey Brodovitch, and Lisette Model and her photographs were first published in Esquire in 1960. In 1963 and 1966 she was awarded John Simon Guggenheim Fellowships and was one of three photographers whose work was the focus of New Documents, John Szarkowski’s landmark exhibition at The Museum of Modern Art in 1967. Arbus’s depictions of couples, children, female impersonators, nudists, New York City pedestrians, suburban families, circus performers, and celebrities, among others, span the breadth of the postwar American social sphere and constitute a diverse and singularly compelling portrait of humanity.
(source https://fraenkelgallery.com/artists/diane-arbus)
About the Publisher
The Met was founded on April 13, 1870, “o be located in the City of New York, for the purpose of establishing and maintaining in said city a Museum and library of art, of encouraging and developing the study of the fine arts, and the application of arts to manufacture and practical life, of advancing the general knowledge of kindred subjects, and, to that end, of furnishing popular instruction.
metmuseum.org
(source https://www.metmuseum.org/about-the-met)
