Ari Marcopoulos
Perimeter Editions and Nieves Books
English
2018
Softcover w postcard
80 pages
200 x 140 mm
ISBN 9780648262886
Air travel has informed Ari Marcopoulos’ life more than most. Beyond a necessary mode of transport, the passenger plane has proved something of quiet point of obsession for the Amsterdam-born, New York-ased photographer and filmmaker.
Before moving to New York in 1980 – where Marcopoulos would carve out a career defined by his raw and intimate renderings of some of America’s most significant subcultural protagonists – he spent much of his childhood flying with his father, a commercial airline pilot. A conversation with Marcopoulos reveals a fascination that still burns. He recalls wandering the tarmac, studying the underside of the wings and fuselage; he remembers riding in the cockpit on an overbooked flight en-route to a Euro Cup final; he flaunts an almost encyclopaedic knowledge of new, old and mothballed commercial airplanes – the Lockheed Super Constellation, Douglas DC-8 Stretch and the Boeing 737-MAX among them.
Boarding Pass, Marcopoulos’ new book for Nieves and Perimeter Editions, takes this experience of flight, and the machines that make it possible, as its defining motifs. Photographed over the last year while in transit, the characteristically intuitive, off-the-cuff images that populate this volume offer countless vantages – near and far – of airplanes on the tarmac or in flight, rerouting our gaze from the pragmatic and economic towards the poetic. Here, Marcopoulos appeals to the notion that flying – for all its supposed monotony – is still something close to a miracle.
About the Artist
Ari Marcopoulos is a photographer, adventurer and film artist of Greek heritage. He is best known for presenting work showcasing elusive subcultures, including artists, snowboarders and musicians. He lives and works in New York.
About the Publisher
Perimeter Editions is the award-winning publishing imprint of Melbourne-based bookstore Perimeter Books and distribution house Perimeter Distribution.
Releasing its first publication in 2012, Perimeter Editions’ focus rests on publishing autonomous books in close collaboration with photographers, artists, curators and writers. Its publications exhibit a criticality and sensitivity to content and form.
Nieves is an independent, one-man publishing house based in Zurich, Switzerland. Founded in 2001, by Benjamin Sommerhalder, an artist with a background in graphic design, Nieves’ focus is on publishing Artists’ Books and Zines. Initially mainly interested in the graphic quality of the material, Nieves output has developed to be increasingly concerned with artistic matters, moving on to thicker printed matter. The work is heavily influenced by foreign culture, in particular Japan, as well as everyday elements of life, creating publications with a wide international reach.
