Julius Shulman: Chicago Midcentury Modernism

Book excerpt: New and vintage photography of America’s modernist architectural mecca. A visionary artist who has achieved worldwide fame, Julius Shulman transformed architectural photography. From his earliest photographs to those taken today, his work demonstrates a profound sensitivity to and appreciation for the spaces in which people live. These spaces, as seen through his lens, are at once luminous and profoundly shadowed, becoming spaces of intrigue and extraordinary beauty into which the observer longs to enter. This volume focuses on Shulman’s Chicago work. This town is America’s First City of Architecture, and its modern architecture is the ideal subject for Shulman’s lens. Featured here are the elegantly modern Minsk House, designed by Keck & Keck in 1955; the 1960 Burton Frank House, a mid-century modern gem; architect Harry Weese’s inspired modernist home and studio of 1957; and many other modern masterpieces.