American Prospects

Times Books
in association with The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
128 pages | 31 x 26 cm
Hardback / Clothbound
05/1987
ISBN 978-0-81291-659-1

First edition of American Prospects illustrated with fifty-five color photographs. 

"American Prospects brought a new respect for color photography and a deeper understanding of American complexity." –Roth, 101 Books

“Joel Sternfeld travelled the country for around eight years with a 8x10 view camera and colour film, a sojourn that produced his first and best-known book, American Prospects... The particular quality brought by Sternfeld to the 8x10 colour-landscape aesthetic... is a clear sense of narrative... In American Prospects, each picture suggests an arcane drama being played out—an elephant stranded on a road in Oregon, or a pumpkin stall in Virginia behind which a house burns fiercely. These narrative hints are suggestive, sly, often ironic, frequently mysterious, making American Prospects less a series of photographs than a series of tales—unfinished, elliptical certainly—that add up to a cogent and persuasive view of America...” (Parr/Badger, The Photobook).