The Naked Eye

The Naked Eye is the first exhaustive monographic publication of the artist’s eponymous series (2008 – present). This bi-lingual publication, published by Bureau New York and Galerie Crevecoeur Paris, features a suite of 58 color reproductions of her celebrated photographs that capture slices of imagery and text within the pages of illustrated books. Essays by French writer Jean Max Colard, ‘Filmo-Biographemes’ and American curator Dr. Cathleen Chaffee, ‘Erica Baum’s Contemporary’, elucidate the work, its context and consider its relevance. A precise, economical storyteller, Erica Baum has become internationally known for her photographic work of the past twenty years, delving into and mining found sources of text and image. Baum has worked with subject matter from art historical indices and library card catalogues to esoteric illustrated parlor games. With a seemingly effortless touch for revealing and framing strikingly elegant compositions, her photographs of the fanned out pages of aging paper back books conjure untold cinematic and poetic dramas seen through Erica Baum’s incisive Naked Eye.