"Traffic, wealth, poverty, violence, and other urban phenomena give way to valiant plant life where ivy thrive on the underside of the 405 and Glendale Freeway interchanges, and a tree in the foothills regenerates itself after a wildfire has parched its bark. Without its plant life and human respect for it, L.A. would be a vast desert void." Bruce Davidson In 2008, Bruce Davidson began exploring Los Angeles from the point of view of its exotic plant life. The arid climate, normally hostile to life, allows for an exceptional botanical diversity in L.A. County that reaches from the surrounding foothills and mountain wilderness to the Pacific Ocean. His images show us both the beauty and banality of urban existence around us.

Hersteller:
Steidl Verlag
mwegener@steidl.de
Düstere Str. 4
DE 37073 Göttingen

Born in 1933, Bruce Davidson began photographing at the age of ten in Oak Park, Illinois. Davidson studied at the Rochester Institute of Technology and Yale University before being drafted into the army. After leaving military service in 1957, he freelanced for Life and in 1958 became a member of Magnum Photos. Davidson's work is held in many major museum collections and his awards include a Guggenheim fellowship (1962) and the first National Endowment for the Arts Grant in Photography (1967). In 2011 he was awarded an honorary doctorate in Fine Arts from the Corcoran College of Art and Design. Steidl has published Davidson's Circus (2007), Outside Inside (2010), Subway (2011), and Black & White (2012).