Aaron Siskind died almost exactly 30 years ago, in February, 1991. I've been a huge fan of his work for most of my life; recently, that interest has been rekindled and I've been keen to take a deeper dive. Unfortunately, most of the information that is readily available is quite dated at this point. Perhaps a young art historian will take up the cause of re-assessing his output, but in the meantime I've picked up a copy of a biography written by Carl Chiarenza in about 1982. In addition to providing a huge amount of personal information, the portfolios show a wider range of photographs than I have seen in one place before. What is of particular interest is that he did some of his best work well into his 70s, and this work is new to me. It is interesting how artists get pigeonholed, with one or two images being widely exhibited and publicized, while other bodies of work languish in obscurity. Pleasures and Terrors is a great pick-up and comes highly recommended.
