The idea for this book began to take shae about two and a half years ago, when Robert Polidori first visited the 'Metropolis' offices. W had heard through mutual contacts that he wondered why we had never called him and instead kept ujsing his work as "pick-up art". Robert told us he had always wanted to shoot Detroit's Michigan Central Station, an eighteen-story office building and terminal that had been abandoned since the1980s. We commissioned the shoot on the spot. It is quintessential urban ruin; we featured itz in our May 2002 issue. During the course of that first discussion, it became apparent to me that beneath the Polidori bluster was a keen oberserver of the built world, a man who could talk astutely about contemporary architecture and urbanism, the meaning of images, the art and craft of photography, its philosophical implications, and much more. It was also clear that a project combining his images and his insight would make a compelling book.
Perlentaucher-Notiz zur Süddeutsche Zeitung-Rezension
Mehr als nur gute Fotos - ein sehr gutes Buch! Denn nach Ansicht des "Zig" zeichnenden Rezensenten gelingt es Robert Polidori, "die poetische Sicht des Künstlers und Geschichtenerfinders" mit dem "diagnostischen Blick des Forschers und Geschichtenerzählers" zu verbinden und sich so dem Phänomen die Rätsel, die Schönheit, die Poesie, die Soziologie - der wuchernden und sterbenden Städte der Gegenwart zu nähern. Ob Pudong, Las Vegas, Bukarest oder Brasilia zu sehen sind - es handelt sich um "eindringliche, suggestiv machtvolle Stadt-Porträts", und der Band an sich macht auch was her, so der Rezensent.
© Perlentaucher Medien GmbH
© Perlentaucher Medien GmbH