Alec Soth is a photographer born and based in the state of Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA. Born in 1969 his photographs have been used in numerous books and exhibitions. His first monograph was entitled ‘Sleeping by the Mississippi.’ 3rd Edition.Gottingen,Steidl. ISBN-13: 978-3865217530

This is a book that I have been asked to look at and express an opinion. This set of work comes together giving people an insight into a world far removed from that of my own. Giving insight into life in Middle America rather than the hyped ‘Hollywood’ America shows the world. This monograph consists of 50 images all carefully crafted showing excellent technique. Soth himself alludes to some of the problems with this type of work in that it is the visually literate that often can only make sense of them and he describes it thus “This is the problem with work like mine, which is more lyrical than documentary. Like poetry, its pretty much useless. Also like poetry, the audience for this type of work usually consists of other practitioners, which is actually a rather large audience. But its frustrating.”

(http://www.seesawmagazine.com/soth_pages/soth_interview.html)

I would disagree with Soth about his work being lyrical as I feel that this work is documentary in its purest form both in style and execution and he is giving the audience a true representation of what exists at that particular point in time along the Mississippi. I do not see pure documentary photography being devoid of emotion I just do not see the need to describe the work as lyrical. As well as his ability to see pictures to document a place and its people his technical ability is also evident in the work.

Although the work is documentary in nature it is not always the mere recording of a scene as Soth interacts with the people in the pictures and all the people he has photographed help in the capture of the image rather than an image be ‘grabbed,’ I do not feel pity for these people (which I sometimes think documentary work is used for) only a curiosity about their lives. Which gives an indication of the respect Soth shows for his subjects. “I truly try to look at people optimistically even with love.” (http://www.seesawmagazine.com/soth_pages/soth_interview.html)

This book is a personal vision for Soth and he talks about this in his interview about the work in ‘SEESAW MAGAZINE’

(http://www.seesawmagazine.com/soth_pages/soth_interview.html) I felt that this work does lack an editorial ‘balance’ with it just showing the ‘decaying’ in terms of the environment and Soth comments thus, “There are no pictures of lavish river condos in Minneapolis, or Skyscrapers in St Louis, I’m aware of those things, but I was shaping my own river. “That’s what photographer usually do right.”

This work once again is very different to my own approach to the landscape image where I try to ‘improve ‘ the scene rather than record and document it. However I really do like this work and can appreciate the narrative aspect as well as the well executed pictures.