Michael Baisden, God’s Gift to Women
For 13 weeks over the course of three years, Dutch photographer Reinier Gerritsen rode the New York City subway to photograph commuters reading on the trains.
His series ‘The Last Book’ is a fascinating visual catalog of subway riders and their choice of reading material, with each portrait accompanied by the title of the book and the author’s name.
The photographer was spurred to capture the increasingly lost art of reading physical books in this age of e-readers.
“This is how it goes. Everything is always changing, but there’s a beautiful phenomenon that’s vanishing. That’s why I wanted to document it,” he told Slate.
Throughout the project, Gerritsen was struck by the diversity of books being read and how each tome spoke volumes about its owner’s identity and personality.
He has published his photographs into a book of the same name, and the series is currently exhibiting at the Julie Saul Gallery till 7 February 2015.
Check out some portraits below and view the project here.
Mary Renault, The Charioteer
Joan Didion, The White Album
Tobias Wolff, The Barracks Thief
Ayn Rand, Anthem
Kurt Vonnegut, Bluebeard
[via PetaPixel and Slate, images by Reinier Gerritsen via Julie Saul Gallery]