Michael Snow, Cover to Cover

Cover to Cover

Michael Snow

Publisher
Primary Information / Light Industry
Year
2020
ISBN
978-1-7344897-1-2
Specifications
Paperback
7 x 9 in
316 pages
Facsimile of the 1975 edition from the Press of the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design
Co-published with Light Industry
Managing editor James Hoff
Managing designer Rick Myers

Michael Snow's classic artist book Cover to Cover, long an out-of-print rarity, is available again in a facsimile edition from Light Industry and Primary Information. Composed entirely of photographs in narrative sequence, it reads like a book made by a filmmaker; Snow himself called it a quasi-movie, built on a precise recto-verso montage. Each page shows one moment from one perspective on the front and from the diametrically opposite angle on the back, sometimes pivoting between interior and exterior spaces, and a picture may show the surroundings of the camera or be a photograph of a photograph. Midway through, the scene is inverted and the volume must be turned upside down to be seen right side up, a study in simultaneity that lets the viewer enter the work from either end. It first appeared in 1975, in a series overseen by Kasper König and later Benjamin H.D. Buchloh. The cover is a black-and-white photograph of a paneled door with a latch, and the pages shown online include a curtained window with plants, a hand, a brick wall and a figure in a checked shirt upside down.

More by Michael Snow

More from Primary Information

Spine Index, an archive of independent photobooks

FIND A
BOOK
/ /
If you leave this unticked you are logged out when you close the browser, or after 12 hours without activity. Cookies and privacy.
/
one year, or a range like 2015-2020
one or more, separated by commas
full or partial
a name, or design: / text: / edited: / translation: and a name

ARCHIVE

Loading…

PUBLISHER

#

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

V

W

X

Y

Z

ABOUT

The project

SpineIndex is an archive of independent books on photography and visual culture: photobooks, publications, design books and self-published editions — the kind of work that rarely makes it into bookshop windows or mainstream catalogues. It exists to document, connect, and keep visible a world of publishers, artists, and makers who operate outside conventional distribution. A living reference for anyone who takes this territory seriously — collectors, researchers, students, and the simply curious.

Images and rights

Covers, interior pages and descriptions are shown to introduce and identify the books, always crediting publisher, author and photographer and linking back to the publisher. We ask publishers for their permission, and we remove anything on request within 7 days. If you are a publisher, an author or a photographer and you want something changed or removed, write to info@spineindex.it.