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Mississippi River

Mississippi River

Headwaters and Heartland to Delta and Gulf

by David Freese

Photographs by David Freese

Foreword by Sarah Kennel

With Simon Winchester

Imprint: George F Thompson Publishing

336 Pages, 11.8 x 11.5 in, 204 toned photographs by the author, 1 historic cyanograph, and 4 color maps

Hardcover
9781938086731
July 2020
In Stock

$50.00

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Praise

IPPY Gold Medal 2021 for best Coffee Table Book
…the most comprehensive and eye-opening rendering of America's most iconic and important river.

Nominated for IPPY's Best Coffee Table Book of 2020

America’s most important and iconic river has many familiar names: The Mighty Mississippi, Old Blue, and Ole Man River. In Mississippi River: Headwaters and Heartland to Delta and Gulf, the third book of his trilogy on North American Waters, David Freese takes us on a captivating visual journey from its source at Lake Itasca in Minnesota 2,552 miles south to the Gulf of Mexico. Freese’s photographs open our eyes to encompass a wide diversity of industry and farmland, cities and towns, landscapes and wildlife, all the while revealing the constant flow of goods, grain, and fuel, up and down the country’s major shipping artery.

The photographs illustrate the ongoing dangers posed by increased flooding and the protective measures taken by the U. S. Army Corp of Engineers to try and keep a restless river in check. There are environmental concerns, ranging from habitat loss to agricultural and pesticide runoff, and the legacy of slavery and the removal of native peoples persist. It’s a river that reveals a complicated past, present, and future as humankind attempts to control nature. American history bends and turns in its waters.

Noted author, Simon Winchester, has written an arresting essay that provides one of the most compelling descriptions and histories yet written about a river that is so much more than a familiar name. The foreword by Sarah Kennel, Curator of Photography at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, places Freese’s images into the canon of landscape photography as a magnificent body of work that documents, critiques, honors, and sanctifies America’s most treasured river.

David Freese has spent the last sixteen years photographing North America’s major waters, resulting in a trilogy of books: West Coast: Bering to Baja (2012), East Coast: Arctic to Tropic (2016), and Mississippi River: Headwaters and Heartland to Delta and Gulf (2020). His prints are in many collections, including the Center for Creative Photography, Cleveland Museum of Art, Denver Art Museum, Haggerty Museum of Art, and Library of Congress, and his photographs have appeared in Communication Arts, Photo District News, Photo Insider, Polaroid International, Popular Photography, Smithsonian Air and Space, and View Camera magazines.

Sarah Kennel joined the High Museum in Atlanta in 2019 as the Donald and Marilyn Keough Family Curator of Photography. She previously served as the Byrne Family Curator of Photography at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts and as a curator in the Department of Photographs at National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.

Simon Winchester is a journalist and New York Times best-selling author of more than twenty books, including The Professor and the Madman (1999), Krakatoa (2003), and The Man Who Loved China (2008). His most recent titles include Atlantic (2010), The Men Who United the States (2013), and Pacific (2015). In 2006, Winchester was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) by Queen Elizabeth II for his services to journalism and literature, and, on July 4, 2011, Winchester was naturalized as a U.S. citizen on board the U.S.S. Constitution.

"The book showcases a masterful visual journey from its source at Lake Itasca in Minnesota 2,552 miles south to the Gulf of Mexico." ~Lens Scratch

"David’s photographs — from the ground, the air, and the river — encompass the Mississippi’s complexity and diversity of culture, industry, and environment. American history, good and bad, bends and turns in its waters as do the promises, problems, and dangers that lie ahead." ~The Photo Review

"Freese shows the river in all seasons, from its icy winters in Minnesota to its midwestern farm fields and towns, to its lush but industrialized Delta and Gulf of Mexico. The photographs show the beauty of the Mississippi, but also its highly constructed state as a river impounded, straightened, dredged, corridored, and nearly poisoned to death." ~The Daily Yonder

"A simple delight to browse and page through one duo-tone image at a time, "Mississippi River: Headwaters and Heartland to Delta and Gulf" showcases memorable aspects of an iconic American river. A remarkable compendium of equally remarkable photography, "Mississippi River: Headwaters and Heartland to Delta and Gulf" is very highly recommended for personal Contemporary American Photography collections, and would make an ideal Memorial Gift Acquisition selection for community, college, and university library collections." ~James Cox, Midwest Book Review