Vince Aletti photographed by Steven Haas

GIFTING: Who is Vince Aletti giving his book to this Christmas?

The author of Issues: A History of Photography in Fashion Magazines tells us who is on his Christmas list

You might be forgiven for thinking that the librarian at New York’s newly reopened Museum of Modern Art has enough reading material for the holiday season. However, Vince Aletti’s proposed Christmas gift isn’t intended to serve as simple winter entertainment.

For years, Aletti, a New York-based writer and critic, has worked to rescue fashion photography – especially fashion photography published in magazines – from the recycling pile, and elevate it to a higher cultural plane.

A spread from Harper’s Bazaar, Harry Emerson 1934. Collection Vince Aletti. As reproduced in Issues: A History of Photography in Fashion Magazines by Vince Aletti

The high point of Aletti’s year came back in the spring, when Phaidon published his book, Issues: A History of Photography in Fashion Magazines. In the book, he selected 100 significant magazine issues from his expansive personal archive, revealing images by photographers rarely seen outside their original context, throwing light on a fresh, idiosyncratic, and previously unexplored angle on the history of photography. It really is a wonderfully curated collection of the images that helped shape fashion. Read on to find out his take on 2019, why MoMA might be getting a copy of Issues and what he'll be up to in 2020.

Harper’s Bazaar, Special Edition, Fall 1962, Gleb Derujinsky. Collection Vince Aletti. As reproduced in Issues: A History of Photography in Fashion Magazines by Vince Aletti

What inspired you most this year? The many activist and resistance movements in the US and abroad, standing up for immigrants, refugees, climate control, and gun control, demonstrating against corrupt systems, repressive laws, and authoritarian politicians.

What annoyed you most? The current, dangerous, and clearly unbalanced President of the United States. But annoyance is too mild a word in this case.

What was your personal highlight? The publication of Issues: A History of Photography in Fashion Magazines, a book I've been imagining for years, and the enthusiastic reception it received in the international press.

A spread from Vogue, Clifford Coffin 1949. Collection Vince Aletti. As reproduced in Issues: A History of Photography in Fashion Magazines by Vince Aletti

What can we expect from you in 2020? I'm hoping to turn 'This Is Not a Fashion Photograph', my monthly column for Vogue Italia, into a book this coming year.

Who will you give your Phaidon book to for Christmas? The librarian at New York's remodeled and newly energized Museum of Modern Art, because I'd love to see MoMA pay more attention to the history of photography in printed matter, especially fashion magazines.

A spread from Junior Bazaar, November 1945, by Hermann Landsoff. Collection Vince Aletti. As reproduced in Issues: A History of Photography in Fashion Magazines by Vince Aletti

Know someone who'd love this season's most fashionable gift? Then buy them a copy of Issues here. This luxury, oversized edition, richly illustrated with brilliant reproductions, and enclosed in an elegant archival-style magazine-file box, is the essential addition to any book collection on photography, fashion, and graphic design. Get their gift here.

Issues: A History of Photography in Fashion Magazines by Vince Aletti

Issues: A History of Photography in Fashion MagazinesVince Aletti

Price AUD$135.00 Price CAD$130.00 Price £75.00 Price T95.00 Price USD$95.00

The first book to showcase and critically explore the groundbreaking photography of fashion magazines over the last century

For nearly a century, fashion magazines have provided sophisticated platforms for cutting-edge photography – work that challenges conventions and often reaches far beyond fashion itself. In this book, acclaimed photography critic Vince Aletti has selected 100 significant magazine issues from his expansive personal archive, revealing images by photographers rarely seen outside their original context. With his characteristic élan and featuring stunning images, Aletti has created a fresh, idiosyncratic, and previously unexplored angle on the history of photography.

Specifications:

Format: Paperback
Size: 324 × 254 mm (12 3/4 × 10 in)
Pages: 468 pp
Illustrations: 670 illustrations
ISBN: 9780714876788

Vince Aletti is a writer, curator, and critic whose work appears regularly in such publications as Artforum, photograph, and Aperture. Aletti was art editor and photography critic of the Village Voice from 1994 to 2005 and reviewed photography exhibitions for the New Yorker’s "Goings On About Town" section from 2005 to 2016. He is the author of The Disco Files 1973-78: New York's Underground, Week by Week (2009, reissued 2018) and coauthor of Avedon Fashion 1994-2000 (2009) and has contributed essays to numerous publications on photography and fashion. In 2005, he won the International Center of Photography Infinity Award for Writing. He lives and works in New York’s East Village.

"Stunning."—The New York Times

"Issues is a testament to the abundance of marvelous photographs that haven't been digitized."—WSJ. Magazine

"Catalogues the seminal work of photographers like Irving Penn, Steven Meisel and others, splashed across the pages of magazines like Vogue Italia, V and Dutch. It highlights certain issues of these magazines, with notes from Aletti on why they are both personal and widely significant."—The Face

"Vince's obsession with print has seen him amass what is likely the largest personal collection of magazines in the world... His sprawling knowledge of photographers, art directors and celebrities is legendary... Vince's fascination with the history of magazine publishing might have led him to go to extreme lengths in securing issues that fill the gaps, but the resulting book has made it something accessible to everyone: the first magazine in Issues is a 1925 issue of Harper's Bazaar, and many of the spreads from these historic issues are being republished for the first time."—i-D

"As any magazine hoarder will know, there is a nostalgic kind of joy to be found in opening up an old glossy. Recalling the clothes we wore, the trends we tried and the celebrities we followed, their musty pages act like Proustian time capsules for a bygone era. For Issues... curator and photography critic Vince Aletti, a collector of magazines since 1965, has turned his own archive into a comprehensive study of the fashion images that have defined the past century... Each selection is significant and accompanied by a short text. While many of the images are familiar in their own right, here it is the reminder of their context - alongside text and straddling the gutter - which makes the book so special."—The Financial Times

"Critic Vince Aletti tours the reader through the vibrant history of fashion editorial, shuttling through visual movements, leading photographers, and unforgettable images curated from all eras of the medium with sharp grace. Filled with rare examples sourced from his own expansive collection, it's an engrossing look at a visual art we often take for granted."—Surface Magazine Online

"A fabulous record of almost 120 years of glossies... It is not an exaggeration to say Issues is a masterwork, a cavalcade of the best of the best. It's a tribute to all of the artistic directors, fashion editors and stylists that have fearlessly pushed forward barriers and educated their readers... This book is a true panorama that traces the growth of fashion as a social and creative witness to changing attitudes and beliefs, from the days when it was a rarified pleasure of the rich to the all-embracing position it is in today. And what a panorama!... This is a book for all who are interested in social and creative development through style, photography, fashion and glamour. Challenging, stimulating and beautiful, there is, literally, nothing to not like about it."—Business of Fashion online

"This gorgeous and glossy big black book... A serious fashion photography book, Issues is a corrective to the genre's presumed superficiality... In the pages... a visual history of the evolution of image-making unfolds... A feast for the eyes: moon shots, Pop art, group shots, fashion art. As Issues shows, the art owes a great debt to fashion image-makers, who powerfully create fantasy, capture mood and constantly reinvent the possibilities of photography itself"—The New York Times

"A celebration of the collaboration that goes into a printed page."—Globe & Mail Style Advisor

"Fall back in love with fashion editorials. Phaidon's new tome, Issues, is a deep dive into the history of fashion photography."—Grazia magazine