FIRST EDITION OF VAN DER ELSKEN’S AMSTERDAM!, 1979

VAN DER ELSKEN, Ed. Amsterdam!: Oude Fotos 1947-1970. [Amsterdam]: Van Holkema & Warendorf, (1979). Oblong quarto, original white photographic stiff paper covers. $650.

First edition of this candid photo-essay on life in Amsterdam in the 1950s and ‘60s, consisting of over 200 finely screened halftones.

Called by some “the enfant terrible” of Dutch photography, Van der Elsken strolled through such great cities as Paris, Tokyo, Hong Kong and Amsterdam making photographs of “striking individuals with character.” “He took the genre of the Dutch photonovel to a new level, and announced the presence in Europe of a stream-of-consciousness photographer on a par with William Klein” (Parr & Badger, 245). This is Van der Elsken’s visual homage to his hometown of Amsterdam, over the 23-year period between 1947-1970. “You can sense the exuberance and energy of this photographer by just leaving through the prints” (Martin Parr). “Throughout these years, Van der Elsken and William Klein often seemed to be shadowing one another… always emphacizing the expressive over the reportorial and always gravitating to society’s margins—to the rebels, the gangsters, the bohemians, the artists” (Roth, 156). Captions in Dutch. See Icons of Photography, 141; Roth, 146; Parr & Badger I, 245; Open Book, 168.

Fine condition, with only minor bump and crease to top corners.