A glimpse of Lucinda Bunnen’s portraits in ‘Eight Photographs’

Eight Photographs: Selections from Lucinda Bunnen’s “Movers and Shakers in Georgia” is one of the more unusual and interesting little books to published locally as of late. At the size of a zine or chapbook, but with the handsome design of Lucy Stovall, the tiny volume collects portraits taken in the late ’70s of eight influential Atlantans who helped shape the arts in the city and pairs each with a short, poetic response from writer.

We see Robert Woodruff, thin cigar dangling from his lips, alongside a quick note from Randy Gue. Jelani Cobb waxes poetic on a portrait of the Reverend Hosea Williams in mid-explanation. The cartoonist Ed Dodd grips a big pipe with his grin next to a little remembrance from Candice Dyer. Bill Arnett, whose collection is featured in this week’s issue, gets a particularly poetic treatment from Kevin Sipp. The cumulative affect has the tone of a sentimental token, but also a focused, eloquent reminder of people whose lives continue to be felt in Atlanta today.

Constance Lewis and Jerry Cullum collaborated to make the book as companion to Lucinda Bunnen: Georgia Portraits, now on exhibition at the Atlanta Preservation Center’s Drawing Room Gallery.

Lewis wrote me this week to explain a little more about the project, saying, “We wanted it to be a poetic little keepsake - something that served as an alternative to the traditional galley catalogue/guide - that reminded us both of the “chapbook” from the old Nexus days; and, we wanted to bring the vintage photographs into a contemporary dialogue by asking a handful of local, knowledgeable curators and writers to select a photograph from the series and give a short, spontaneous response (within a tight framework of 250 words only and a two-week deadline). It was a very ‘spontaneous’ undertaking that is very likely to become a larger volume in the future.”

The book, which is available in a limited edition of 150 copies, is available at the Atlanta Preservation Center for $20.