Overview

Who owns the land, by whose authority, and with what rights? These questions led Mitch Epstein to make Property Rights, a collection of photographs and short texts examining the American government's ongoing legacy of property confiscation, and how communities gather to resist. Epstein began this series in 2017 at Standing Rock, where thousands protested the installation of the Dakota Access Pipeline on Sioux land. Over four years, he charted other contested lands from Pennsylvania and Hawaii to the Mexican border, as well as land loss through wildfires and flooding due to egregious environmental negligence. In keeping with Epstein's 50-year exploration of American life, Property Rights questions the relationship between institutions, civil rights and the rights of nature itself. Acknowledging our bodies and lives as our most fundamental property, the book examines other forms of trespass and destruction in an elegy to the Tree of Life Synagogue massacre, and in photographs of Black Lives Matter protests during Covid-19. Property Rights includes the voices of activists Epstein interviewed while making this deeply personal and political work. In a time of alarming division, the book describes diverse communities in a common fight against politicians and plutocrats willing to sacrifice the people's well-being.

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9783958299016

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Reviews

It's one thing to profess one's concern for urgent issues; but it's quite another to travel to so many hot spots to put the one tool one knows well to as good a use as possible. Property Rights is an overtly political book by a member of a generation that has often shied away from making political work (even as they might loudly profess their admiration for books like Robert Frank's The Americans). I think the creation of this book is a very important statement on its own.--Jorg M. Colberg Conscientious Photo A stark but sensitive examination of American life and land under the Trump administration ... A gut-wrenching but graceful project.--Lauren Moya Ford Hyperallergic His photographs are always lucid and eloquent, and often very beautiful despite their grim subjects. There is no empty rhetoric here.--Lucy Sante New York Times The book makes a powerful argument that returning to a more collective concept of our place in nature may be the only solution towards saving this tenuous place that we call our 'nation'.--Brienne Walsh Forbes: Media Explores the illusory nature of the American Dream and the role of resistance against the powers that be.--Miss Rosen Blind Documents many of the most contentious sites in recent American history, capturing environments of protest, discord and unity. [Property Rights showcases] the majesty of America's natural landscape with its fraught history of claimed ownership, prompting pressing yet enduring questions of power, individualism and equity.--Chadd Scott Forbes: Media Foregrounds the tension between sublime American landscapes and corporate agendas.... Epstein's images remind the viewer that resistance movements can endure longer than the news cycles covering them, and many individuals completely restructure their ways of life in order to stand up for their beliefs.--Eric Sutphin Art in America Land, dignity, and ethics: Mitch Epstein photographs the remnants of our American Dream.--Clara Malley Document Journal Magnificent images [...] reflects pressing issues ranging from immigration to our threatened environment.--Andrea K. Scott New Yorker Politics and citizenship, or environmental degradation and land rights, Epstein focuses on tough topics, helping us see overlapping, and often competing, histories and perspectives.-- Juxtapoz Property Rights is a vivid series of large-format photographs made across the United States. In an era largely defined by issues of citizenship, immigration, and environmental degradation, Epstein frames the land itself as a charged site of both discord and unity.-- Art & Object Property Rights, though it focuses mostly on threatened landscapes, is part of an established trajectory mapped out over decades of work ...an anachronistic sequence that heightens the connections between new and archival photographs.--Rebecca Bengal Aperture

Documents many of the most contentious sites in recent American history, capturing environments of protest, discord and unity. [Property Rights showcases] the majesty of America's natural landscape with its fraught history of claimed ownership, prompting pressing yet enduring questions of power, individualism and equity.--Chadd Scott Forbes: Media Foregrounds the tension between sublime American landscapes and corporate agendas.... Epstein's images remind the viewer that resistance movements can endure longer than the news cycles covering them, and many individuals completely restructure their ways of life in order to stand up for their beliefs.--Eric Sutphin Art in America Land, dignity, and ethics: Mitch Epstein photographs the remnants of our American Dream.--Clara Malley Document Journal Magnificent images [...] reflects pressing issues ranging from immigration to our threatened environment.--Andrea K. Scott New Yorker Politics and citizenship, or environmental degradation and land rights, Epstein focuses on tough topics, helping us see overlapping, and often competing, histories and perspectives.-- Juxtapoz Property Rights is a vivid series of large-format photographs made across the United States. In an era largely defined by issues of citizenship, immigration, and environmental degradation, Epstein frames the land itself as a charged site of both discord and unity.-- Art & Object Property Rights, though it focuses mostly on threatened landscapes, is part of an established trajectory mapped out over decades of work ...an anachronistic sequence that heightens the connections between new and archival photographs.--Rebecca Bengal Aperture

A stark but sensitive examination of American life and land under the Trump administration ... A gut-wrenching but graceful project.--Lauren Moya Ford Hyperallergic His photographs are always lucid and eloquent, and often very beautiful despite their grim subjects. There is no empty rhetoric here.--Lucy Sante New York Times The book makes a powerful argument that returning to a more collective concept of our place in nature may be the only solution towards saving this tenuous place that we call our 'nation'.--Brienne Walsh Forbes: Media Explores the illusory nature of the American Dream and the role of resistance against the powers that be.--Miss Rosen Blind Documents many of the most contentious sites in recent American history, capturing environments of protest, discord and unity. [Property Rights showcases] the majesty of America's natural landscape with its fraught history of claimed ownership, prompting pressing yet enduring questions of power, individualism and equity.--Chadd Scott Forbes: Media Foregrounds the tension between sublime American landscapes and corporate agendas.... Epstein's images remind the viewer that resistance movements can endure longer than the news cycles covering them, and many individuals completely restructure their ways of life in order to stand up for their beliefs.--Eric Sutphin Art in America Land, dignity, and ethics: Mitch Epstein photographs the remnants of our American Dream.--Clara Malley Document Journal Magnificent images [...] reflects pressing issues ranging from immigration to our threatened environment.--Andrea K. Scott New Yorker Politics and citizenship, or environmental degradation and land rights, Epstein focuses on tough topics, helping us see overlapping, and often competing, histories and perspectives.-- Juxtapoz Property Rights is a vivid series of large-format photographs made across the United States. In an era largely defined by issues of citizenship, immigration, and environmental degradation, Epstein frames the land itself as a charged site of both discord and unity.-- Art & Object Property Rights, though it focuses mostly on threatened landscapes, is part of an established trajectory mapped out over decades of work ...an anachronistic sequence that heightens the connections between new and archival photographs.--Rebecca Bengal Aperture

It's one thing to profess one's concern for urgent issues; but it's quite another to travel to so many hot spots to put the one tool one knows well to as good a use as possible. Property Rights is an overtly political book by a member of a generation that has often shied away from making political work (even as they might loudly profess their admiration for books like Robert Frank's The Americans). I think the creation of this book is a very important statement on its own.--Jorg M. Colberg ""Conscientious Photo"" A stark but sensitive examination of American life and land under the Trump administration ... A gut-wrenching but graceful project.--Lauren Moya Ford ""Hyperallergic"" His photographs are always lucid and eloquent, and often very beautiful despite their grim subjects. There is no empty rhetoric here.--Lucy Sante ""New York Times"" The book makes a powerful argument that returning to a more collective concept of our place in nature may be the only solution towards saving this tenuous place that we call our 'nation'.--Brienne Walsh ""Forbes: Media"" Explores the illusory nature of the American Dream and the role of resistance against the powers that be.--Miss Rosen ""Blind"" Documents many of the most contentious sites in recent American history, capturing environments of protest, discord and unity. [Property Rights showcases] the majesty of America's natural landscape with its fraught history of claimed ownership, prompting pressing yet enduring questions of power, individualism and equity.--Chadd Scott ""Forbes: Media"" Foregrounds the tension between sublime American landscapes and corporate agendas.... Epstein's images remind the viewer that resistance movements can endure longer than the news cycles covering them, and many individuals completely restructure their ways of life in order to stand up for their beliefs.--Eric Sutphin ""Art in America"" Land, dignity, and ethics: Mitch Epstein photographs the remnants of our American Dream.--Clara Malley ""Document Journal"" Magnificent images [...] reflects pressing issues ranging from immigration to our threatened environment.--Andrea K. Scott ""New Yorker"" Politics and citizenship, or environmental degradation and land rights, Epstein focuses on tough topics, helping us see overlapping, and often competing, histories and perspectives.-- ""Juxtapoz"" Property Rights is a vivid series of large-format photographs made across the United States. In an era largely defined by issues of citizenship, immigration, and environmental degradation, Epstein frames the land itself as a charged site of both discord and unity.-- ""Art & Object"" Property Rights, though it focuses mostly on threatened landscapes, is part of an established trajectory mapped out over decades of work ...an anachronistic sequence that heightens the connections between new and archival photographs.--Rebecca Bengal ""Aperture""

Author Information

A pioneer of 1970s art photography, Mitch Epstein has photographed the landscape and psyche of America for half a century. His awards include the Prix Pictet, the Berlin Prize and a Guggenheim Fellowship, and he was recently inducted into the National Academy of Design. Numerous collections hold his work, including the Museum of Modern Art and Tate Modern; in 2013, the Walker Art Center commissioned a theatrical rendition of his ""American Power"" series. Epstein has described the cultural and physical evolution of the United States from 1973 to 2019 in his Steidl books Family Business (2003), Recreation (2005), American Power (2011), New York Arbor (2013), Rocks and Clouds (2017) and Sunshine Hotel (2019).

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