Antlitz der Zeit [The Face of Our Time]

Munich: Transmare Verlag/Kurt Wolff Verlag, 1929. First edition. original cloth, original dust jacket, original slipcase. Very Good. FIRST EDITION OF SANDER'S CLASSIC: A REMARKABLE COPY IN EXTREMELY RARE DUST JACKET AND SLIPCASE. August Sander "was part of a coterie of photographers who established the photographic book as an aesthetically and commercially viable art form in the 1920s. Though Sander had published one such book in 1924, Unsere Heimat, Hannover, it was the 1929 publication of Antlitz der Zeit (The Face of Our Time) that propelled him into enduring fame" (Warren, Encyclopedia of Twentieth-Century Photography).

"Many of his classic (truncated) images are included in this seminal photobook, and the essential qualities of Sander's vision can be seen. He took typical examples of professions, trades and social classes in Weimar Germany, and photographed them in their familiar environments in order to build up, piece by piece, a dispassionate image of the 'face' of society... One of his work's miracles is how, despite his nominal objectivity, his political view shines through... His work is not neutral. It is not just penetrating, but was seen as positively dangerous, a little too acute in its analysis of society and class, by those with certain vested interests. This is made clear by the fact that when the Nazis came to power in Germany in 1933, publisher's copies of Antlitz der Zeit were seized, the plates destroyed, and the negatives confiscated by Hitler's Ministry of Culture" (Parr and Badger, The Photobook, I.124). Roth 52.

With rare subscription sheet promoting Sander's "Menschen des 20. Jahrhunderts" ["People of the 20th Century"] laid-in.

Munchen: Transmare Verlag/Kurt Wolff Verlag, 1929. Quarto, original yellow cloth, original dust jacket, original slipcase; custom box. Dust jacket in exceptional condition, with very light occasional spotting, small chip at spine head, in general very clean. Scarce original slipcase with only light toning at edges and few small spots.

EXCEEDINGLY RARE IN DUST JACKET AND SLIPCASE AND IN SUCH OUTSTANDING CONDITION. THE FINEST COPY WE'VE SEEN. (Inventory #: 2308)