Reviews
Picturing Frederick Douglass marries all of my present interests: legacies of slavery; beautiful images of a beautiful man; and the first theory of photography as a democratic medium capable of social change. Stunningly original and elegantly written and designed, it will inspire anyone interested in the links between the visual and the verbal., This stunning volume presents 160 photographs, some for the first time, and they not only follow Douglass throughout his life but also place him within the times he lived.... Stauffer, Zoe Trodd, and Celeste-Marie Bernier point out that Douglass saw the truth-telling aspects of photography and how it could be used as a tool in the fight against slavery, as photos both humanized African Americans and revealed the horrors of their enslavement. This tour de force is a must-have that will enhance history and reference collections., Striking.... The most exciting images in the book are those that show us how these 19th-century portraits became, over the decades that follow, a part of the symbolic surround of the modern American landscape.... The words in this highly visual book are perhaps even more powerful than the images.... Pictures conveyed a precision akin to religious truth, an affective prerequisite for social movements., Picturing Frederick Douglass is to be shared, studied, read and repeated every six months, not only in the classroom but in our living rooms...Beautifully researched and storied...A true treasure!, Picturing Frederick Douglass is to be shared, studied, read and repeated every six months, not only in the classroom but in our living rooms.... Beautifully researched and storied.... A true treasure!, A unique scholarly and aesthetic achievement.... The book is the result of intrepid research and brilliant analysis; it charts Douglass's life visually, allowing him to look back at us wryly, wistfully, wrathfully. Rarely can a book such as this reach us with ideas and the sublime., Nothing less than a masterpiece in the fields of biography, African-American history, and not least of all the neglected area of iconography...A riveting instant classic and a pure pleasure to behold., An impressive collection...give[s] a wonderful picture of the man, his intellect, and his devotion to his main cause, abolition.... The authors have pieced together an illuminating life portrait without extraneous biographical material, focusing intensely on their subject's belief in the strength of photographs., Nothing less than a masterpiece in the fields of biography, African-American history, and not least of all the neglected area of iconography.... A riveting instant classic and a pure pleasure to behold., In Picturing Frederick Douglass, Stauffer, Trodd, and Bernier offer exhilarating scholarship and our idea of Douglass and our sense of photography in nineteenth-century America are deepened. This is brilliant and very moving work., Douglass emerges here out of photographic technology''s earliest years, with majestic beauty, and through the power of his own self-creations. The book is the result of intrepid research and brilliant analysis; it charts Douglass''s life visually, allowing him to look back at us wryly, wistfully, wrathfully., This illustrious book collects all 160 photographs of renowned abolitionist Frederick Douglass and astutely places Douglass's personal interest in photography into the context of his career and legacy.... This study provides a multifaceted, unique look at one of the most influential figures of American history., Beautifully crafted and contextualized.... the extant photographs illuminate American history and memory., With 160 photographs, many never before seen, this book provides a strong visual history of Douglass and his era. Douglass believed that photography had extraordinary social power, and the inclusion of previously unpublished writings and speeches on visual aesthetics show him to be an important theorist of the new art form., Picturing Frederick Douglass marks a significant turn in the long history of Douglass's reception. Both as a subject for photography and as a critical theorist who reflected on the democratic, humane, and truth-telling powers of the medium, Douglass emerges in this beautiful volume in a completely new light., Douglass emerges here out of photographic technology''''s earliest years, with majestic beauty, and through the power of his own self-creations. The book is the result of intrepid research and brilliant analysis; it charts Douglass''''s life visually, allowing him to look back at us wryly, wistfully, wrathfully., These images don't change your mind; they smash through some of the warped lenses through which we've been taught to see., Douglass emerges here out of photographic technology's earliest years, with majestic beauty, and through the power of his own self-creations. The book is the result of intrepid research and brilliant analysis; it charts Douglass's life visually, allowing him to look back at us wryly, wistfully, wrathfully.
