In the late 1960s, the photographer and photography teacher Joseph Szabo first discovered Jones Beach state park in Nassau County, New York. Since then, Szabo has struck up friendships with the lifeguards on duty at what is surely among the busiest beaches in the world, finding them as fascinating as the bodies they watch over. Restful and alert, solitary and part of a team, aloof and involved, the lifeguard is a unique character and a local celebrity on the beach.
Joseph Szabo: Lifeguard documents the photographer’s encounters and friendships with the Jones Beach lifeguards in photographs taken between 1990 and 2015. Portraits in the most expansive sense of the word, the images in this volume illustrate the day-to-day preparation, teamwork, relaxation, camaraderie, duty and responsibility in the lives of these figures that Szabo has come to know and respect.
A sensitive and wry observer, Joseph Szabo (born 1944) has been called the “quintessential photographer of the teenager.” He is best known for his photographs of adolescents taken in and around the halls of Malverne High School in Long Island, where he taught photography from 1972 to 1999, which were published in the photobook classic Teenage (Greybull, 2003). Turning his camera on his students to get their attention, Szabo captured the anxiety and bravado of the American teenager in classic documentary style black-and-white photographs that quickly attained cult status in the fashion world.
Featured image is reproduced from 'Joseph Szabo: Lifeguard.'
PRAISE AND REVIEWS
AnOther Magazine
Joe Szabo provides a stunning documentation of the ‘superheroes of the beach’
New York Times
John Leland
The photographs here... cover 1990 to 2015, but the beach seems to suspend time. Though lifeguards carry cell-phones now, the basic struggle between people and sea remains the same.
New Yorker
Andrea Denhoed
Szabo captures the strenuous physicality of the lifeguards’ work...But he also captures the sensation of endless summer days and, somehow, of endless youth.
L'Officiel
Laura Van Straaten
Szabo has not lost his eye for capturing the cool and the un-cool.
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Featured image is reproduced from Lifeguard,Damiani's new collection of Joseph Szabo's Jones Beach lifeguard photographs made over the last twenty years. "The hard-core lifeguards return decade after decade," Greg Donaldson writes, "like the swallows to Capistrano, because they believe they have the best job on earth. Unlike guards at most California and East Coast beaches, who almost always sit alone, Jones Beach veterans recline on elaborate tiered main stands that accommodate seven or eight guards at once. While the newcomers and weekenders ride the wing stands solo, the full-timers with seniority sit together, study the water, and kibitz. When they make a rescue or catch a good wave on a surfboard or kayak, they do so in front of a jury of old friends. They have such a good time on the job that they often stay for hours after their shift is over and forget to punch out." continue to blog
"The lifeguards appear when a victim's life has been reduced to a single moment, an agonizing encounter with an untimely death. Yet the lifeguards themselves, seated above the throng on gleaming white chairs, are the very symbols of youth and immortality. A weak swimmer can easily lose his life in a storm-whipped sea, and the job of a lifeguard isn't without its perils: Jones Beach guards have been smashed on the jetty and swept out to sea, even run through by the oarlocks of the old wooden dory boats. But with the strength and know-how to cheat the great sucking grip of the surf, ocean lifeguards are virtually drown proof. In the 85 year history of Jones Beach, not one has ever drowned. On late summer days when hurricanes send burly swells pulsing toward the South Shore of Long Island, when the surf turns white and thunderous and the water is closed to patrons, the lifeguards swim, paddle, and row out into the maelstrom smiling." —Greg Donaldson, Joseph Szabo: Lifeguard continue to blog
FORMAT: Hbk, 11.5 x 9.25 in. / 96 pgs / 42 b&w. LIST PRICE: U.S. $40.00 LIST PRICE: CANADA $55 ISBN: 9788862085427 PUBLISHER: Damiani AVAILABLE: 3/27/2018 DISTRIBUTION: D.A.P. RETAILER DISC: TRADE PUBLISHING STATUS: Active AVAILABILITY: In stock TERRITORY: NA LA
In the late 1960s, the photographer and photography teacher Joseph Szabo first discovered Jones Beach state park in Nassau County, New York. Since then, Szabo has struck up friendships with the lifeguards on duty at what is surely among the busiest beaches in the world, finding them as fascinating as the bodies they watch over. Restful and alert, solitary and part of a team, aloof and involved, the lifeguard is a unique character and a local celebrity on the beach.
Joseph Szabo: Lifeguard documents the photographer’s encounters and friendships with the Jones Beach lifeguards in photographs taken between 1990 and 2015. Portraits in the most expansive sense of the word, the images in this volume illustrate the day-to-day preparation, teamwork, relaxation, camaraderie, duty and responsibility in the lives of these figures that Szabo has come to know and respect.
A sensitive and wry observer, Joseph Szabo (born 1944) has been called the “quintessential photographer of the teenager.” He is best known for his photographs of adolescents taken in and around the halls of Malverne High School in Long Island, where he taught photography from 1972 to 1999, which were published in the photobook classic Teenage (Greybull, 2003). Turning his camera on his students to get their attention, Szabo captured the anxiety and bravado of the American teenager in classic documentary style black-and-white photographs that quickly attained cult status in the fashion world.
