This richly illustrated volume is the first critical look at the early
career of Arthur Tress, a key proponent of magical realism and staged
photography.
Arthur Tress (b. 1940) is a singular figure in the landscape of postwar
American photography. His seminal series, The Dream Collector, depicts
Tress's interests in dreams, nightmares, fantasies, and the unconscious
and established him as one of the foremost proponents of magical realism
at a time when few others were doing staged photography.
This volume presents the first critical look at Tress's early career,
contextualizing the highly imaginative, fantastic work he became known
for while also examining his other interrelated series: Appalachia:
People and Places; Open Space in the Inner City; Shadow; and Theater of
the Mind. James A. Ganz, Mazie M. Harris, and Paul Martineau plumb
Tress's work and archives, studying ephemera, personal correspondence,
unpublished notes, diaries, contact sheets, and more to uncover how he
went from earning his living as a social documentarian in Appalachia to
producing surreal work of "imaginative fiction." This abundantly
illustrated volume imparts a fuller understanding of Tress's career and
the New York photographic scene of the 1960s and 1970s.
This volume is published to accompany an exhibition on view at the J.
Paul Getty Museum at the Getty Center from October 31, 2023, to February
18, 2024.
