“USING COLOR TO BRING TEXTURE AND HEAT”: FIRST EDITION OF WEBB’S UNDER A GRUDGING SUN

WEBB, Alex. Under a Grudging Sun. Photographs from Haiti Libéré 1986-1988. (London): Thames and Hudson, (1989). Large quarto, original stiff red photographic wrappers. $100.

First edition of the second book by award-winning photographer Webb, with 59 high-keyed, color saturated plates of Haiti in the explosive years between the collapse of the Duvalier dictatorship and the blood-soaked elections of 1988.

A forerunner of what has been called the “new photojournalism,” with an interest “in the complexity of issues and events… [rather] than producing easily digested” images, Alex Webb shares with fellow Magnum photographer Susan Meiselas an instinct for “how high-keyed color might convey… [a] tropical palette… using color to bring texture and heat” to these provocative images of a country on the edge of chaos (New York Times). First edition, printed in wrappers only; English and American editions published same year, no priority established.

A fine copy.