The Works

RRB Photobooks are pleased to present this rare opportunity to own all three of John Myers's publications with us in this Collector's Edition format. Each of the books in this slipcase are the same number from within the edition.

The Portraits, shot throughout the 1970s in the West Midlands, shows the people of Myers's native Stourbridge and its surrounds. Understated, yet slightly discomfiting, The Portraits have cemented Myers's position as a revolutionary within British photographic tradition.

Looking At The Overlooked describes a way of encountering the world. The images, all taken within walking distance of Myers’ home in Stourbridge are scenes encountered without narrative or emotion, as if Myers were the first person to come across the places he turned his lens upon. The work is sequenced as a journey through a town, generic and not site specific, a backdrop to the mundane and everyday that is too often seen and yet unconsidered as part of our visual landscape.

The End of Industry completes the triology. The photographs were taken between 1981 and 1988 in ‘The Black Country’ a part of England that was famous for making things from metal. Changes occurred in the early 1980s that hit metal manufacturing particularly hard. A record number of bankruptcies resulted in high levels of unemployment. The factories, foundries, forges and steelworks - were transformed into retails parks and housing. Myers's document of this irreversible change is all the more poignant as Britain's industries and identities are once again in such a period of change.

The Works contains each of the books, as well as the following silver-gelatin prints; in unlimited 5x4" - Giraffe, 1973 (The Portraits), The Bed, 1976 (Looking At The Overlooked) and Bricks drying, William Mobberley Brickworks, Kingswinford, 1983 (The End of Industry). Each print is signed and dated to the verso.

The books are also available to purchase separately in both standard and special edition while stocks last.