Horses: Photographs

Book Description
More than a hundred extraordinary portraits—lush, rich, textured, sculptural—that reveal the spirit and nobility of the horse. Portraits of horses gazing at the camera, standing in the golden light, stamping away flies, galloping, bucking, rolling in the dust.

They are the work of Michael Eastman, a self-taught photographer influenced by Edward Weston, Walker Evans, and Henry Moore, who spent thirty years capturing the essential nature of subjects that range from Cuban life to landscapes to architecture in many places. Now he turns his refined eye to the magnificent horse.
Eastman has caught the animal’s complexity and power, fear and courage, goodness, masculinity, femininity, uniqueness.

“All animals are wonderful,” says Eastman, “but horses are truly mythic.”

From the Inside Flap
More than a hundred extraordinary portraits—lush, rich, textured, sculptural—that reveal the spirit and nobility of the horse. Portraits of horses gazing at the camera, standing in the golden light, stamping away flies, galloping, bucking, rolling in the dust.

They are the work of Michael Eastman, a self-taught photographer influenced by Edward Weston, Walker Evans, and Henry Moore, who spent thirty years capturing the essential nature of subjects that range from Cuban life to landscapes to architecture in many places. Now he turns his refined eye to the magnificent horse.
Eastman has caught the animal’s complexity and power, fear and courage, goodness, masculinity, femininity, uniqueness.

“All animals are wonderful,” says Eastman, “but horses are truly mythic.”

About the Author
Michael Eastman’s photographs have appeared on the cover of Time, and his work has been published in Life and the New York Times. Eastman is a recipient of a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. He lives in St. Louis, Missouri.


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Eastman does not take pretty pictures of horses. And it's not just because, as critic/novelist William Gass observes in his brief but deep introduction, "These are quite ordinary horses. Riders rent their backs." A self-taught photographer whose work ranges widely (The Forgotten Forest; Ten Inner-City Churches), Eastman approaches these noble creatures with a startling lack of sentimentality, capturing them at odd angles, with the occasional quizzical look, twisted lip, or weary eye. Readers used to celebratory depictions of the horse down through the ages might at first balk, but after careful study the power and beauty of Eastman's images become evident. Shot in sepia tones that suggest a haze of dust, they are deeply honest renderings of the equine spirit and the horse's uniquely beautiful architecture. A fine addition to large photography and natural history collections, and any library serving horse people should consider strongly. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 6/1/03.]-Barbara Hoffert, "Library Journal" Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.


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