Balthazar Korab Architect of Photography

Description

While Balthazar Korab's photography has been widely published in books on architecture, landscape and design and his contributions to the representation of midcentury Modern architecture has been greatly celebrated, there has never been a publication dedicated exclusively to his life, career and practice. This book will be the first monograph on Korab and includes a broad and comprehensive presentation of his professional architecture photography. In addition to this extensive portfolio, Balthazar Korab, Architect of Photography highlights previously unpublished images, lesser known (though no less significant), produced throughout his career. A thorough, illustrated biography traces the evolution of Korab's sensibilities and practices as they developed in relation to his life experiences, his training as an architect, unique among his contemporaries, and his rather circuitous path to a career in photography places the collection of photographs into context. A foreword by Cesar Pelli offers further insight into Korab's life.

John Comazzi is an Assistant Professor of Architecture, he teaches undergraduate and graduate level design courses and research seminars. He has been a personal acquaintance of Balthazar, Monica, and Christian Korab since 1997, when as a graduate student in architecture he assisted in the assembly of an exhibition of Mr. Korab s photography at the University of Michigan. Since 2006 he has conducted over twenty five hours of interviews with the Korabs and has spent countless hours examining the photographic archives in the Korab studio. He has lectured on the life and career of Balthazar Korab in both public and academic venues and together they have curated and assembled several traveling exhibitions.

"Mr. Korab captured the romance, moodiness and humanity of even the most austere post-war buildings." -- David Dunlap, The New York Times "Highlights the rich, black-and-white photography of Bathazar Korab, whose sharp imagery helped give a face to modernist architecture in mid-century America." -- Dwell "[Korab's] work's enduring value is as a document of the push and pull of midcentury, the conflict between the curve and the cube at the moment America became the center of world design." -- Wall Street Journal "Celebrating a talent who traded drafting tools for a camera, Balthazar Korab collects his images of buildings by Eero Saarinen, Minoru Yamaski, and other modern greats, as well as his still relevant series on American car culture." -- Elle Decor "Mr. Korab, now 86, left design to be an in-house photographer, documenting masterworks like Mr. Saarinen's T.W.A. Terminal and Miller House. His story and images, dramatized by more than a touch of chiaroscuro, are collected in "Balthazar Korab: Architect of Photography," by John Comazzi, just out from Princeton Architectural Press ($40)." --- The New York Times