Three Photographic Books

1. Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz aka Witkacy, was a polish photographer among other things (painter, philosopher, novelist, and playwright.) He was born in Warsaw and lived from 1885-1935. He indulged himself in psycho-active drugs and thus created peyote-type masterpieces.

Jadwiga Witkiewicz, 1923

Witkiewicz, Stanislaw Ignacy. "Witkacy: Metaphysical Portraits." Leipzig: Connewitzer Verlagsbuchandlung, 1997.

Witcacy blew my mind, as he did his own long ago. The photographs in Metaphysical Portraits are unreal - literally philosophically related to the subject of reality, but in a playful if not sinister kind of way. His portraits are electrifying, to me he almost photographs the portrait of evil in his subjects as if it were fun. His compositions are very close and personal but not tight at all. They are psychedelic paintings infused with a warm watery light - very deep and soft. His photographs rejoice in the victory of Cain and achieve a convincing goodness and leave me absolutely fascinated.

2. Lewis Carroll is mostly known for his fantastic allegory in Alice in Wonderland. However, Carroll was much more than an author, he was a mathematician and photographer as well- and a quite divine one at that. He was born in Cheshire and lived from 1832-1898. He began to experiment with photograph in 1856, and used wet collodion process.

Carroll, Lewis. "Lewis Carroll: Masters of Photography." Great Britain: Macdonald & Co Ltd, 1984.

Carroll's photographs are truly a site to see. It astonishes me how well I can relate to his photographic works after having such familiarity with his prose. His work centers around portraits, many of which of children. These portraits are so wonderful because in fact he captures the real child: bored, silly, unsexed, imaginative, cranky, comfortable, and misunderstood. These photographs are angelic, beautiful, and homely - taken with an old father's eye.

3. Neil Folberg was born in San Francisco in 1950. In 1967 he began to study under Ansel Adams. He in his wife settled in Jerusalem in 1976. He began photographing in the Sinai until it was returned to Egyptian control. His photographs are a series of starry landscapes and middle eastern ruins.

Folberg, Neil. "Celestial Nights." New York: Aperture Foundation Inc, 2001.

Celestial Nights is a collection of absolutely stunning photographs of the ends of the earth towards the heavens in Jerusalem. Folberg's photographs are magical, majestic, and other-worldly. They pertain to only the outer-space mystic. They contain the softest terrain with whimsical woods, and millions of bright stars that we are only so fortunate to have captured on a page. The lighting is truly magnificent, it is perfect because you forget they are photographs - you forget about the photographer all together. It is only you alone with an image that could only greet you in your dreams.