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City Lust

London Guangzhou Lagos Dubai Houston

___________

Charlie Koolhaas presents a timely dialogue between words and images about a crucial moment in our recent history: the apotheosis of globalization and its current unraveling.


English edition
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Title Details
By Charlie Koolhaas
2020
Hardback
412 pages, 354 color illustrations
20.5 x 30 cm
ISBN 978-3-85881-804-1

In her new book, Charlie Koolhaas takes us to London, Guangzhou, Lagos, Dubai and Houston, cities in which she has either lived or worked. Her personal and humorous account explores the rapid changes taking place in these culturally vastly different metropolises that are being united by the influences of global trade and the evolution of a shared global culture. A captivating combination of photographic documentary and written testimony. City Lust portrays a global landscape that contradicts the current pessimism—to reveal new creativities, unexpected possibilities and intimate connections that emerge despite huge global and economic divides.

Echo

Interview with Charlie Koolhaas Dutch TV VPRO Mondo—have a look at the video!

"Smart analysis and humorous stories." Ulrich Rüter, Leica Fotografie International

"Photo diary of the London-born artist with photographs from Lagos, Dubai or Houston, which succeed in making visible still undescribed phenomena and moods of the present." Niklas Maak, Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung

"Charlie Koolhaas has developed a kind of everyday photography, unembellished and therefore exciting. In contrast to her knowledgeable essay about today's global trade routes and their everyday protagonists, a wonderful commitment to our contemporary urban world is created." Steffen Kühn, KULTUR-EXTRA

"A compelling combination of photographic documentation and written testimony." Regina Plaar, Deutsche Gesellschaft für Photographie e.V.

"Koolhaas has a refreshingly honest and democratic eye that assesses both rich and poor, with a particular concern for the role of minorities in each country. The photographs and the accompanying verbal vignettes are a pleasure to view and read, especially because of the large size of the pages and the design that makes full-bleed printing of the images extraordinarily graphic. […] Tolerance of differences is not easy, but acceptance and respect for others are desperately needed. Our own limitations cause us to be anxious about others. The world-wide demonstrations going on right now and the analyses in this photobook clearly tell us to overcome engrained dislikes and to consider treating others and our world more equitably. " Gerhard Clausing, PhotoBook Journal

"Koolhaas's writing—clear and sharp, humorous and honest—serves to ‘frame the world through a perspective’ rather than record reality. All of the experiences work with the photographs to describe places where the friction of cultural, economic, and other factors rub up against each other to create lived realities where considerations of authenticity, beauty, or other aesthetic concerns are just preposterous. Photos of perfume bottles, ugly buildings, uglier highways, and other subjects might not convey why some people lust for cities, but they certainly describe how cities accommodate so many people of different religions, ethnicities, and levels of income. It's an ugly mess beautifully captured in Koolhaas's images and words." A Daily Dose of Architecture Books

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