WOMAN: A CELEBRATION

San Francisco, CA: Chronicle Books, 2003. First Edition. First Printing.. Hardcover. As New/No Dust Jacket, As Issued.. San Francisco, CA: Chronicle Books, 2003. Hardcover. As New/None, As Issued. First Edition/First Printing. 150 pages. Retrospective collection of photographs. One of the most beautiful photography books of its kind ever published in our time. The First Hardcover Edition. Precedes and should not be confused with all other subsequent editions. Published in a small and limited first print run as a hardcover original only. The First Edition is now rare. An austerely elegant production by Peter Fetterman and Scott Rivera: Small-size volume format. Orange cloth boards with photographic reproduction pasted in front and white titles embossed on the cover and spine, as issued. Photographs by various contributors, a Who's Who of 20th-century and contemporary art photography. Introduction by Peter Fetterman. Essay by the legendary Hollywood actor and collector Whoopi Goldberg. Publisher's Sleeve intact. Printed on pristine-white, thick coated stock paper to the highest standards. Without DJ, as issued. Presents "Woman: A Celebration". A gem. Every single portrait in this book is a beauty: "A photographic homage to Woman in all her glorious diversity and mystery. From a rare image of a grinning Greta Garbo to the direct gaze of a young Guatemalan woman, 'Woman' revels in the breadth of the human experience, with the feted and the nameless shoulder-to-shoulder. The work of dozens of immortal photographers - Henri Cartier-Bresson, Elliott Erwitt, Julia Margaret Cameron, Willy Ronis, Ruth Orkin, and many more - fills this volume. These photographs embody the many moods of their subjects in a breadth of photographic styles, from sepia-tinged Pictorialism to guilelessly Modern. A book as captivating as its focus, this small but substantial package is virtually a history of the photographic medium vis-a-vis its timeless subject" (Publisher's blurb). The "direct gaze of a young Guatemalan woman" is otherwise known as "La Rosa" ("The Rose"), Luis Gonzalez Palma's single greatest portrait. Like another great artist/photographer/lover of his subject, he can honestly say: "My medium is Woman" (Alfred Stieglitz). An absolute "must-have" title for Luis Gonzalez Palma and photography book collectors. This copy is very prominently, uniquely, and beautifully signed in black ink-pen on his Contribution ("La Rosa", Plate #65) by Luis Gonzalez Palma. It is signed directly on the page itself (right underneath the plate, as he would have signed an original print), not on a tipped-in page. It is Gonzalez Palma's single greatest portrait. This title is a photography book classic. As far as we know, this is the only such signed copy of the First Hardcover Edition/First Printing available online and is in especially fine condition: Clean, crisp, and bright. Please note: This signed copy comes directly from Luis Gonzalez Palma's Chicago gallery. Copies available online have serious flaws, are subsequent printings, or are remainder-marked. A rare signed copy thus. 120 black-and-white and color plates. Some of the greatest photographers of our time. A fine copy. (SEE ALSO OTHER LUIS GONZALEZ PALMA TITLES IN OUR CATALOG). ISBN 0811840980.