By Larry Fink
Published by powerHouse Books, 2001 – Purchase with a grant from the W. Eugene Smith Fund / Sold at cost by the publisher –
Location : Studio Sakse – Chiang Mai, Thailand
Essay by Max Kozloff
Larry Fink knows that class, defined as both economic ranking and cultural polish, are not mutually exclusive categories, a theory beautifully defended in this book, his famed first monograph (published by Aperture in 1984). Here we find an elegant exploration of two distinctly different cultures: the upper crust of New York City society and the down-home folk of Martins Creek, Pennsylvania. Straddling these worlds, Fink photographed society black tie events, capturing dioramas of stale emptiness lurking in the sensuous decadence, switching gears with raucous, emotionally dynamic photographs of his farm neighbours, the Sabatine family.
The dramatically redesigned reprint of Social Graces captures the deft sequences of the original edition, yet allows the full power of Fink’s work to be truly appreciated with sumptuous full-page presentation. This new “director’s cut” also features a number of never-before-published photographs from the influential original series, as well as perhaps the best essay ever written of Fink’s work, a review by acclaimed art critic Max Kozloff.
