Transition
($45.00, $12.98)
The diary-like photographs in her new project, Transition, taken over a period of five years, depict a group of young girls—at a lake near New York in the summer heat, for instance, in the parks and gardens of Paris, or in southern landscapes. While Birnbaum’s subtle power of observation is attuned to the phenomenon of childhood, it also examines the initial awakening of an as-yet-undefined femininity: an interplay of innocence and allure that is revealed on the path from childhood to adolescence. The camera itself becomes an element in the lives of these girls, a kind of accomplice to the act of self-discovery, of forging their own identity as women.

Digging in the City of Brotherly Love
($35.00, $15.98)
Beneath the modern city of Philadelphia lie countless clues to its history and the lives of residents long forgotten. This intriguing book explores eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Philadelphia through the findings of archaeological excavations, sharing with readers the excitement of digging into the past and reconstructing the lives of earlier inhabitants of the city.

Michael Hardt presents Thomas Jefferson
($14.95, $7.48 ea.)
In 1776 Thomas Jefferson, a future president authored the most explosive document in the history of America: “The Declaration of Independence”, formally severing the link between America and the British state. Michael Hardt, co-author of the groundbreaking “Empire and Multitude”, examines this and other texts by Jefferson, arguing that his powerful concept of democracy is, seen through contemporary eyes, a biting critique of the current American administration’s tyranny.

Vultures’ Picnis
($26.95, $8.98)
With Palast at the center of an investigation that takes us from the Arctic to Africa to the Amazon, Vultures’ Picnic shows how the big powers in the money and oil game slip the bonds of regulation over and over again, and simply destroy the rules that they themselves can’t write-and take advantage of nations and everyday people in the process.

Obesity The Biography
($24.95, $12.48)
Obesity: The Biography looks at this claim and the very notion of “global obesity” as the major contemporary public health threat and puts it into historical perspective. The various claims as to what obesity is, what causes it, who gets fat (and fatter), is looked at from the medicine of the ancient Greeks, who used food as therapy to contemporary America, where “organic” food is thought to be just as effective in preventing illness. The medical history of obesity, of diet, and of exercise, from the Bible’s condemnation of eating pork to Benjamin Franklin, who founded the very first swimming club, gives us an insight into complex social and cultural meanings associated with food and fat.

Guy Pene du Bois: Painter of Modern Life
($39.95, $17.98)
Guy Pene du Bois (1884 – 1958) was one of America’s most stylish painters, a keen observer of the social scene around him who deftly captured the sophisticated spirit of his era with a subtle and effective wit. It was during the 1920s that he achieved the style for which he is best known. The 1930s marked an impressive monumentality in his compositions and he received commissions to do two Post Office murals which stand today. By the end of the 1940s, the artist was part of the old guard, dismissing the rise of the New York School. Yet he remains one of the most articulate interpreters of the tradition of urban realism. Betsy Fahlman traces the life of the artist who, like his contemporary Edward Hopper, did his early work under Robert Henri. Like Hopper he spent time in Paris – well documented here with reproductions. But it is the more stylised and haunting works, particularly portraits, of his later years for which he is best known and they are here in abundance.