Dark City is a natural sequel to Lynn Saville's colour photographs in Night/Shift (Monacelli, 2009). Her work in that book made her, in the words of Arthur C. Danto, "the Atget of vanishing New York, prowling her city at the other end of the day, picking up pieces of the past in the present, just before it is swallowed in shadows." This book is a further exploration of the urban landscape at dusk and dawn, with a new focus on the effects of the recent economic turmoil on New York and other American cities. Shuttered stores and empty lots in city centers and fringe areas alike reveal a haunting and disquieting beauty. Occasionally, a person or the artist herself is visible as a ghosted image or shadow. Photographs in Dark City also counter-balance signs of loss with a more optimistic message. They reveal a natural cycle of decay and rebirth in urban ecology, as objects such as ladders and brooms signal that the work of renewal is under way. Dark City is ultimately a dynamic and ongoing dialogue between defined place and empty space that will fascinate general readers and urban specialists alike.

Author Biography

Fine-art photographer Lynn Saville was educated at Duke University and Pratt Institute. She specialises in photographing cities at twilight and dawn, or, as she describes them, "the boundary times between night and day." Her photographs have been widely exhibited in the U.S. and abroad. Dark City (Damiani, 2015), with an introduction by the well-known British critic Geoff Dyer, is her third book. Her two previous monographs are Acquainted With the Night (Rizzoli, 1997) and Night/Shift (Random House/Monacelli, 2009), with an introduction by Arthur C. Danto. Saville has won a number of awards, including fellowships from The New York Foundation for the Arts and The New York State Council for the Arts; a Premio in the Scanno, Italy, Festival of Photography; and First Place in the Architecture category, Women in Photography International. Her work is represented by the Yancey Richardson Gallery in New York and is in the permanent art collections of major museums, corporations, and individuals. She lives in New York City with her husband, the poet Philip Fried.