I rarely get mail. What I mean is I rarely get mail that isn’t bills. I’ve gotten off most of the junk mail lists, so day after day I check my mailbox and there’s nothing there. That is usually good, but I still feel that child-like sense of surprise when something I hadn’t expected shows up.

 

Last week I was surprised by some wonderful things. First up, the catalog from Mainland, a show I curated both for gallery and online for The Kiernan Gallery in VA. It’s a lovely little book and I finally get to see the names of the winners whose work I selected. Thank you Kat.

And two days ago I came home and there was a box at my door that turned out to be special heart chocolates from my BFF Heather. There is no photo because I ate them! Mmmmmmmm good!

Finally, and most unexpected, was No Fixed Format, an overiew of Rob Hornstra and Arnold van Bruggaen’s Sochi Project. What perfect timing!

 

This piece came from Kummer & Herrman, graphic designers and long-time collaborators with Hornstra & van Bruggen. I’m thrilled to have been sent this.

It gives, as they say, “an overview of the most striking expressions of this project. It showcases the large variety of ways to disseminate and present documentaries. It demonstrated what visual storytelling in a collaborative manner is about.” Fantastically important and creative.

I also bought the following photo books from one of my favorite, secret places to get books on sale: Genesis by Sebastiao Salgado, Maddie on Things by Theron Humphrey (with Maddie the coonhound) and A Portrait of Ice by Caleb Cain Marcus, a perfect winter purchase.

Genesis is another unbelieveable compilation by perhaps the premier living documentary photographer, Sebastiao Salgado. The book is huge and heavy, both in weight and subject matter.

According to Salgado, it is his “visual ode to the majesty and fragility of Earth”. It has also caused controversy since  the project’s exhibition at the Natural History Museum in London was sponsored by Vale, a Brazilian mining company that is despoiling the Amazon.

By now everyone should know Maddie on Things, a lighthearted, and wonderful project/book begun by photographer Theron Humphrey  as he drove across the U.S.  photographing and interviewing the people he met (This Wild Idea). I had the pleasure of meeting both Theron and Maddie, and have been a supporter of his work since I first came across it. Hopefully one day we’ll meet again, and they will both sign my book.

 

A Portrait of Ice, the work of photographer Caleb Cain Marcus seems an apropos purchase for this winter, a winter that doesn’t want to leave us. It’s a large format, minimalist book. I dream of seeing icebergs before they all disappear, and I find this a meditative study of ice, beautiful and haunting. For me, a real discovery.

 

And thanks to Stephanie Sinclair who was kind enough to send me a print of the family I sent a bit of Christmas cheer to in The Bronx.

So even while the Post Office is losing money, and we have all these electronic ways of communicating, nothing beats opening your mailbox and finding a surprise.