Easter and Oak Trees

@ Van Manen, Bertien

9781907946462

New

Presentation by Mack:

"Bertien van Manen’s blissful images of family holidays in den Eikenhorst (literally meaning Nest of Oak Trees) from the 1970s are the subject of her latest publication, Easter and Oak Trees.

It was her son, one of the primary subjects in the series, who recently reminded van Manen of the archive. Lightness dominates these black and white images, and the obvious pleasure, family warmth and security of her children and family in the less politically correct ‘70s. Children pose, play and run but ultimately the photographs communicate the intimate comfort that comes with family, uninhibited in their expression and exposure to the camera. Easter and Oak Trees offers an enticing invitation to share a small part of this familial idyll.

The images raise the question, could a photographer still do this in 2013? Could she photograph her children naked, footloose and carefree, acting up to the camera with fake cigarettes and a bottle of beer? Or is this spontaneity, this innocence, lost thanks to rancid affairs and small-minded moralism?

Whilst this work is some of the earliest made by van Manen, it has all the qualities found in her mature work.

“One recognizes the lyrical looseness, the sensuality and the melancholy but also a striving for balance and composition. Her photographs look like free, insouciant improvisations on themes, that later, in ‘a Hundred Summers a Hundred Winters’ or in ‘East Wind West Wind’ have taken shape in a more outspoken way”. --Hripsimé Visser"

112 pages - Hardcover w/ DJ

25 color & 89 b&w plates

Mack, 2013

New - Mint condition

This book is no longer in stock

$28.61

Van Manen, Bertien

Bertien Van Manen is a Dutch documentary photographer. After studying literature and languages, she started working as a fashion photographer and then, inspired by Robert Frank's "The Americans", she traveled for long periods, with her camera, and developped a more documentary-oriented work and practice. In particular, she traveled in China, in the United States (Appalachia), Russia and the former USSR. Bertien van Manen has published many photobooks, somme following projects made on commission, such as "A Hundred Summers, A Hundred Winters" (De Verbeelding, 1994) and "Let's Sit Down Before We Go" (Mack, 2011) in the former USSR countries, "Moonshine" (Mack, 2014) about families in the rural mining regions of Appalachia and "Beyond Maps and Atlases" (Mack, 2016) in Ireland. She has also published more personal work, for instance "I Will be Wolf" (Mack, 2017) about one of her earlier trips, in Hungary, or even much closer to her family life: "Easter and Oak Trees" (Mack, 2013). In 2021, Mack again, publishes "Archive", an overview of her career and work, drawing also from her personal archive of unpublished work.
  • Presentation by MACK:" Since the 1970s, Dutch photographer Bertien van Manen has created intimate and poignant photographs of commonplace scenes, produced during extended trips to Europe, America, China and the former Soviet Union. Van Manen has established herself as a unique voice in documentary photography, her visual language imbued with empathy and...

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  • Publisher's presentation : "In this new body of work, Beyond Maps and Atlases, Bertien van Manen turns to Ireland. Van Manen says, « At first, working in Ireland I wasn’t sure what I was looking for. My husband had died. I dispensed with the people and reflected on the atmosphere. I was guided by a feeling and a search, a longing for some kind of meaning...

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  • .Copy sold. Publisher's presentation: "I have to like the people I photograph. I need to feel an attraction, a fascination."  --  Bertien van Manen "Buried deep in Bertien van Manen's images is an intimacy between photographer and subject. The viewer trespasses on the private moments in the frame, catching a glare over breakfast, unheard words between...

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