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Click in any photo for a larger version of the series.
Blaise Tobia
Book Works
I have increasingly turned to the book (and its digital equivalents) as a form of presentation well suited to my practice, given its reliance on pairings, sequences and serial formats, and
given the fact that many of my works require an accumulation of of images to establish their formal and conceptual strategies. All
but one of these books (Castle of Eufemio)
are printed via a digital on-demand process.
They are available for purchase. Optionally, they may be purchased in a signed version with an original print included.
South Chicagoland 1988
I photographed the post-industrial south side of Chicago in the summer of 1988 while residing at the University of Chicago for an NEH seminar. The color 645 negatives remained unprinted until 2020, when I scanned them and put together this book.
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Pillars of the Community
former banks of Detroit (1981-82)
While residing in Detroit I photographed many buildings that had built as banks but subsequently converted to other uses. (Almost all of the banks had failed in the crash of 1929.) I found this to be a valuable window into material culture, as each building manifested clear layers of semiotic intent. The poor recovery of Detroit post-Depression preserved these buildings (unlike in other cities where development pressures caused them to be demolished).
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Plain + Fancy
This book presents my Plain + Fancy series of paired images contrasting the exteriors and interiors of Amish carriages. The exteriors, following Amish tradition, are plain: monochrome, untextured, undecorated. The interiors are surprisingly fancy: vibrantly colored and textured, and often highly decorative. The differences are determined by public vs. private distinction (central in many religious traditions/cultural traditons beyond the Amish).
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Slight Perturbations of the Surface
This book was one of two catalog for my O.K. Harris exhibition "Binary Codes" that included this series of paired images. The series originated during a 2007 residency at the Vermont Studio Center and juxtaposes images drawn from a broad documentation of global material culture.
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Signs + Wonders
This was the second catalog for the "Binary Codes" exhibition at O.K. Harris. "Signs + Wonders" was my first paired-image series, started in 1995. It grew to have ten component series, including "Semiotics," "Urban Gardens," "Sites," and "Art for Art's Sake." This book presents a sampling of the entire set.
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Poor Mao (Shopping in China)
These photos were made during my first trip to China, in 2008. I set myself the task of finding remnants of Maoist China in the midst of Deng Xiaoping's shopping-oriented China. But I also observed Chinese society at a time that may have coincided with its peak of personal freedoms and pro-western sentiment.
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Confronti : Comparisons
This is my second book on Italy; the photos were made between 1990 and 2010. The book's spreads include thematic pairings and trios. The photos represent a wide range of Italian material culture including tourist attractions, historical sites, street art, and outdoor advertising.
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Castle of Eufemio
a small Sicilian town and its extraordinary festival
My family's town of origin in Sicily, Calatafimi, is well known throughout Italy because it was the site of Garibaldi's first battle in the reunification of Italy, in 1860. After a century of emigration (much of it to Brooklyn) its population has decreased from 12,000 to about 5,000, but it still manages to put on a great show every few years on the festival of its patron "saint" Il Santissimo Crocifisso (The Most Holy Crucifix). I made these photographs at the 3-day festival in 2004. (It was my first project shot digitally.)
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Caveat Emptor
I first created this text/image series in 1981, using photos I'd made at the Michigan State Fair and texts photographed out of a 1952 Civil Defense Warden's Manual. It was published as a newsprint book by the Local Paper of Oberlin Ohio. In 2021 I made a higher quality facsimile of the original book.
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