William Eggleston- Stranded In Canton (with Lou Reed)

I'm not big on "going negative." It's way too easy and hardly novel these days, when everyone's ready to cuss out anyone at the get go. But then you come across something the likes of William Eggleston's latest "book," Stranded In Canton, and you kind of ask yourself, "What the fuck?"

I had no idea what the major premise behind this "book" was (if one can, in fact, call it one) when I came upon it, or the DVD contained within. Basically, the book portion consists of a couple of grainy, blurry B&W photos that look like grainy, blurry B&W film stills. Perhaps what's contained within the cover is the greatest artistry ever burned unto disc, I would hope so since this has no reason whatsoever to exist as a book- well, other than because of the name.

And now I find out that none other than Lou Reed has been named a guest curator at the 2010 New York Photo Festival- and don't get me wrong, I've been a looong time fan... of his music, that is. And I have no idea if I saw his first, or his second book- but whatever I saw was one level above the aforementioned Stranded, or very much at home on your average FLICKR photostream... If that was number one that I saw, why on earth was there a number two? And if it was number two that I saw...

Aren't there enough legit photographers already out there who can't get their work published? I guess you could argue that a name like Lou's could help pump in some much needed revenue and publicity- in that case, I hope he plays Coney Island Baby...