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PUBLISHER
Steidl

BOOK FORMAT
Clth, 10 x 13 in. / 128 pgs / 73 bw.

PUBLISHING STATUS
Pub Date 12/18/2018
Active

DISTRIBUTION
D.A.P. Exclusive
Catalog: SPRING 2017 p. 74

PRODUCT DETAILS
ISBN 9783958292727 TRADE
List Price: $45.00 CAD $62.00

AVAILABILITY
In stock

TERRITORY
NA ONLY

THE SPRING 2026 ARTBOOK | D.A.P. CATALOG

Preview our SPRING 2026 catalog, featuring more than 500 new books on art, photography, design, architecture, film, music and visual culture.

America’s Stage: Times Square

Photographs by Betsy Karel.

In America’s Stage: Times Square, street photographer Betsy Karel (born 1946) uses five New York City blocks as a metaphor for urban America today. Her premise is that many of the major trends of our society are present in Times Square: globalism, consumerism, ubiquitous sexualization, hucksterism, surveillance, narcissism. All are compressed and amplified here. In Karel’s photos fantasy parades as reality, corporate interests invade almost all public spaces, and Times Square becomes a vivid, almost hyper realistic, form of theater.

“Karel is a native New Yorker who haunted Times Square to find what most of the city’s dwellers seek to avoid: the tourists and everything that exists for them in that historic mecca. She records the intermingling of those responsible for the cacophony, those reacting and those who appear oblivious. She recognized the sadness that co-exists with outrageous exhibitionism, the excessive signs competing for attention with 24/7 congestion, workers, beggars and lovers.” —Anne Wilkes Tucker

Featured image is reproduced from 'America’s Stage: Times Square.'

PRAISE AND REVIEWS

Eye of Photography

Karel brings us America’s Stage: Times Square, a new photobook from Steidl that explores the exhilarating and exhausting corner of the city that we call Times Square.

Lenscratch

Aline Smithson

Photographer Betsy Karel takes a insightful look at this crush of humanity.

MetroSource

Paul Hagen

Karel’s collection of more than 70 black-and- white images document the essence of the City that Never Sleeps.

Musee

Sarah Sunday

...tourists, hawkers, masquerading characters, lovers of free speech, brides and grooms are pictured in black and white streaming and weaving through the busy streets... the strangeness of human nature is concentrated and magnified through the lens of Karel’s camera.

Guardian

Masked musicians, military tanks and Batman all play parts in the daily theatre captured by Betsy Karel of New York City’s famous intersection – loved by tourists, shunned by locals.

Photoweenie

Jim Fitts

Betsy Karel Began To Photograph Times Square In 2014 And Has Over The Last Several Years Amassed A Portfolio Of Black And White Photographs Exploring The Chaotic Five Blocks That Make Up One Of The Most Interesting And Unique Parts Of The World.