Lee Friedlander: Chain Link - Hardcover

Friedlander leads us to question the fear, the possessiveness, and the traditions that have us dividing our world into plots for keeping some things out and letting others in.--Max Campbell "The New Yorker "

Lee Friedlander is celebrated for his ability to weave disparate elements from ordinary life into uncanny images of great formal complexity and visual wit. And few things have attracted his attention―or been more unpredictable in their effect―than the humble chain link fence. Erected to delineate space, form protective barriers and bring order to chaos, the fences in Friedlander’s pictures catch filaments of light, throw disconcerting shadows and visually interrupt scenes without fully occluding them. Sometimes the steel mesh seems as delicate as lace; at others it appears as tough as snakeskin. In this book’s 97 pictures, drawn from over four decades of work, it recurs as versatile, utilitarian and ubiquitous―not unlike the photographer himself.

[Friedlander] is the only American photographer working whose images have assured him a place among the photographers he admires: Atget, Evans, Cartier-Bresson, and Frank. Lewis Baltz