What are a few tips and advice you might offer for someone interested in starting to collect photography?
Find a reputable art advisor to help educate them and get them started with the “a-b-c’s” of collecting. Preference to work with someone not affiliated with a gallery that represents artists since you want to find someone who will be their advocate and have an unbiased approach to advising and have no vested interested but theirs
Are there any new talented photographers to watch?
Absolutely but remember buying new and young is akin to buying new and young stock options or real estate ventures; so it is riskier business but rewards can be good if you buy right. I advise always to buy what you like and if you want to buy young talent to combine that with more established artists. There are many photographers who are now showing in the contemporary art arena and are experimenting with technology. There are different ways to see what is new – one of which is follow the photography shows at local and national museums and NY MoMA has a Young Photographer’s Showcase
Who are your favorite fashion/art classics?
Andy Warhol for painting and prints. He is an absolute icon but must buy from very reputable sources; William Klein, one of the best fashion photographers, who combined a street aesthetic to his fashion work of the 1950s and still very affordable; Vik Muniz, major contemporary art photographer whose work is affordable and extremely beautiful with deep conceptual and art historical depth.
You have published photographic books of New York, what inspired you to publish “The Twin Towers an Elegy”?
I published The Twin Towers an Elegy within eight months of 9-11; as just that, a beautiful object meant to preserve images of New York and the Twin Towers during their lifetime coinciding with my coming to age in 1970s and 1980s New York. This book is meant to show beautiful images and have us remember the Towers as our beacon during the decades they were with us, and not mangled piles of steel; the other book, “Contemporary Photography in New York” was to show how artists in the last decade plus have viewed this city, in sharp contrast to the 20th century image of New York being Manhattan symbolized in black and white in vertical skyscrapers. This book shows a horizontal New York that expands to the boroughs and shows a different century, and one that is now dictated by technology, which is represented in many of the images.
What inspired you to launch a publishing company?
Loving images and pictures so much, which is related to my love of history, I relish being able to go through the visual history of photography and cull images in themes; so I did many huge exhibitions and books based on such wide spread themes as Kissing (in Photography): Weddings, Children, Baseball, Marilyn Monroe. Nothing better in the world is a great photograph to transport us back somewhere and also show something anew.
What books would you recommend as holiday gifts from Picture This?
I would recommend highly the “Ormond Gigli” monograph- this is not a book I published but one I helped see through and get made and it shows the breadth of one of the great fashion photographers of the latter 20th century who hitherto had only been known for his one famous image, but has many more to share.
What inspired you to launch Peach Editions, your ecommerce art and photography company?
I have been involved with ecommerce and art since 1999 when I started what was to be the world’s largest ecommerce site for art, onview.com. Since then I have been immensely involved in every aspect of art on the internet both in ecommerce and curating and it seemed fitting for me to do a site that was devoted to younger more affordable photographers to an audience that were interested to have beautiful affordable images on their walls but did not have as their main mandate a need to invest in art and buy art as a financial asset.