There's no denying [Hartman's] abilities as a photographer. Shape,
color, and light, he has an impeccable eye for composition, for
juxtaposing line against line, drawing the viewer's eye into his
subject...In North Dakota, he likes a flood-drenched plain in
orange twilight, one stretch of barbed wire fence in a strong
horizontal, another triangulating stretch (just the fence posts
visible above the water) disappearing into the distance. In South
Dakota, he gives us a flat plain with alternating gold, green, and
brown strips of field, a dark storm building
overhead...Accompanying the first third of Hartman's photos is a
new essay by William Kittredge (always an occasion)...There is no
one more authoritatively positioned to comment on the West than
Kittredge, nor anyone who can write about it half as well' -
NewWest.net. 'Tells the story of the region in textures of flaking
paint and rust juxtaposed against stunning sunsets and big skies.
Intense color photographs narrate the 1500-mile, often-inhospitable
route from Texas to Canada' - Texas Parks & Wildlife. 'A lavish
and glorious new coffee-table book ...Hartman has a gifted eye for
both the natural and man-made vistas that he encounters, and his
color images are breathtaking. Beginning in North Dakota and
working south, Hartman presents pictures that are themselves
eloquent essays in rural and small-town spaces. An aura of
loneliness and abandonment clings to many of these shots. It's no
secret that people have been fleeing the harsh physical and
economic realities of the Great Plains for years, and these
pictures document that fact. Unpainted farm houses and rickety
windmills hold silent vigil amid awesome expanses of earth and sky,
weeds grow through a Nebraska sidewalk, and an old truck rusts into
the Oklahoma soil...A testament to the alluring visual appeal of
this country's great middle' - Mobile Register. Resulting from an
arduous series of six journeys along the two-thousand-mile line
that divides East from West, Monte Hartmans perceptive photographs
provide the intimate yet dispassionate observations of a person who
chose to explore the meanings inherent in the great empty middle
between our coasts. These images inspired William Kittredge to
travel the Meridian himself. His essay, an unblinking yet sensitive
musing on what once was and what now remains, offers a poignant
counterpoint to Hartmans visual tapestry. 'This slice of North
America requires stamina unimaginable to the rest of us, and is
populated by enduring people who've lost all patience with
strangers when their efforts to convey their attachment to this
place have fallen on deaf ears. It is not easy to know why a land
so lonesome, so often melancholy, parts of which have never
surpassed frontier density, will go on having such meaning to those
who choose to stay. Hartman and Kittredge, discerning souls, have
caught their attachment' - Thomas McGuane, author of The Cadence of
Grass. '""Americas100th Meridian"" exposes our nations heartland in
its beauty and desolation land as open and mysterious as the palm
of Gods hand' - Annick Smith, co-producer of ""A River Runs Through
It"". 'A breathtaking reminder of the beauty concentrated in that
narrow slice of the continent' - ""North Dakota Quarterly"". 'An
astounding coffee-table book tour ...A truly splendid and pristine
memory, capturing timeless moments and locations' - ""Wisconsin
Bookwatch"". 'A testament to the alluring visual appeal of this
country's great middle' - ""Mobile Press-Register"". Monte Hartman
has an M.A. in art from UCLA and forty years of experience in
photography, design, and the arts. He lives with his wife in
Hayward, California. William Kittredge, one of America's great
Western writers, has authored many books, including ""Hole in the
Sky"" and ""Who Owns the West?"".
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