BORIS MIKHAILOV | Case History

Mikhailov's seminal and haunting documentation of post-Soviet urban conditions in Ukraine. The photography is real, poetic, and gritty.  Contains nudity.  Dust jacket has very light shelf wear. Three pages of the book have tiny 1/8" closed tear at the edge. Otherwise clean and crisp. Near fine or very good ++ overall. Included in "The Photobook: A History Volume II" (p. 309). Parr and Badger write : “Case History seems to be not just about documenting social conditions, or even the photographer's relationship to these people, but the very process of making the work and the implications deriving from it - in a practical, psychological, political, moral and even economic sense. It is an immensely troubling, complicated book and although one might feel that Mikhailov has overstepped the moral mark, his awesome sense of purpose and coruscating honesty redeems his images just at the point when they seem irredeemable." "Boris Mikhailov, whose "Unfinished Dissertation" was published in 1998 by Scalo, focuses in "Case History" on what he believes is the result of the break-up of the former Soviet Union. Though Mikhailov considers the conditions of his particular place of residence for over fifty years crucial to his work, he is not providing a recollection of the specific history of Kharkov, Ukraine. Rather, he brings out the "condition humaine" in this city characterized by industry and factories, by newly installed Coca Cola billboards as well as socialist architecture. Kharkov provides the backdrop for Mikhailov's moving portraits describing the decay of both social structures and individual lives. We witness street kids taking drugs, adults in search of food, trying to re-install their social self by cleaning their bodies in the artist's own apartment. Despite devastating poverty, the women and men in Mikhailov's images look back at us with great dignity. Their eyes express an unbroken will to survive in a social system that has broken down completely. Very warmly Mikhailov depicts the harshness of everyday life in a society not as far away from ours as we might think.” - from the back cover 6.8 x 9.5 inches