Dream/Life, Trent Parke, op-shop score.

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itf

itchy trigger finger
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I wandered into an op-shop the other day looking for horrible clothes for a party and found a copy of Trent Parke's first book Dream/Life for $5. Stoked! I really recommend it to anyone. The photos are all around Sydney in the mid to late 90's, before he joined Magnum.
 
Very nice find! I am still kicking myself for not buying a signed copy of The Seventh Wave (also a great parke book) that I found at a local bookstore for a fairly cheap price. Didn't have the cash with me, came back a few days later and it was gone.
 
He's fantastic. I love his eye for the moment as well as the ease that he can catch very formal ideas in that moment. In other words, he really understands how the camera sees and uses it intentionally---not an easy thing to do! On the Magnum site there is a series on camel racing that shows some of what I mean. There is a camel head in shadow and he over-exposed it to get the head right but it blasted out the body and neck. Shucks, I might as well show the photo...

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I especially like his black and white because of his wonderful eye for abstraction and the moment. I see great beauty in his colour street photos on InPublic, but they don't grab me so emotionally. He really does know how to make a picture of something extraordinary, as opposed to a picture that just states a fact.

I just found a colour one that does what I was talking about in bw. So I guess he's just all around great now... ;)

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Anyway, he's real photo auteur and I enjoy his work a lot.
 
OMG, I wanted to buy this book, but was not willing to pay $400 second-hand.
You've made a perfect purchase.
 
palec said:
OMG, I wanted to buy this book, but was not willing to pay $400 second-hand.
You've made a perfect purchase.
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Holy s#@*!!! I thought you must've been talking about a limeted edition or something, but I just checked amazon and googled it... What? I've moved it from the dining room table now.

:eek::confused:
 
I think a lot of the prices being asked for OOP books on the Internet are just wishful thinking by dealers. Just because they list for a high price doesn't mean that anyone is paying that.

I went to the opening of Trent Parke's new show in Sydney tonight 'the Christmas Tree Bucket'. It's quite different from his past work & I reckon a lot of photo squares will hate it. It's at the ACP on Oxford St.
 
itf said:
It doesn't matter to me anyway, it only owes me $5 and I don't plan on selling it. One thing though, why are there two different cover pictures for this book? One uses this picture: http://www.in-public.com/TrentParke/image/1497

...while mine has this cover: http://www.photobookstore.co.uk/blog/?p=76

What's the deal?
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Heh, looks like your $5 purchase turned into a real score! My guess is that it's either a proof/review copy, or an exhibition copy. I thought my signed copy was a nice rarity, but yours trumps it I reckon.

Great book BTW.
 
Funny this just came up again, I had another op shop score the other day. I got a working Olympus XA4 with A11 flash for $3.

It's selling used on amazon for $1,100 right now...
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Hmmm, and I'm strapped for cash...
 
Oh, and my girlfriend got one of the little rolleis with the fixed collapsible lenses a few months ago for $2.
 
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