Episode 19: Alan Rapp
episode transcript

Original airdate: November 25, 2021
61 minutes, 13 seconds

Jennifer Yoffy 00:06

Welcome to Perfect Bound. I'm Jennifer Yoffy, the founder and publisher of Yoffy Press in Atlanta, Georgia. This is a podcast where we talk to artists about their journey, how they got where they are, what right and wrong turns they made along the way and where they're heading next. Alan Rapp is editorial director at Monacelli Press a division of Phaidon. He's an editor, book developer and writer specializing in photography, architecture and design. He started his visual book publishing career at Chronicle Books, where he developed the photography list and published books by Eleanor Carucci, David Maisel, Jona Frank, Jim Marshall, Linda Conner, Henry Hornstein and others. Under the Monacelli umbrella, he's collaborated on new works by Eleanor Carucci, her book Midlife and Jona Frank - Cherry Hill, as well as Cig Harvey's fourth book, Blue Violet. He's contributed to several books, and his writing has appeared in numerous print and web publications, including The PhotoBook Review, Modern Painters, and Urban Omnibus. Please welcome my friend Alan Rapp to the podcast. Okay, so you want to get started? Are you ready?

Alan Rapp 01:28

Yes, let's do it.

Jennifer Yoffy 01:30

So you started your love affair with books and with publishing as a bookseller, and then a publicity assistant. So can you talk a little bit about how you transitioned into editing art books, because I think that's really interesting that you started on one side of it, and kind of got into the more creative aspect over time.

Alan Rapp 01:50

Yeah, absolutely. Um, so I went to school in Los Angeles, Loyola Marymount, and that is partway through college. But back into high school, I was I was a bookseller. And, you know, I was just really taken with what this company in San Francisco, Chronicle Books was doing, I was very familiar with them by the time I moved to San Francisco after college. And not knowing almost anything about publishing, I decided to apply and thought, you know, that's where that's where the editors go. And that's what you do, really having no idea about any of the other dimensions. I mean, you know, like, every, every film that has someone in publishing, they're an editor, so I hadn't, you know...or Elaine from Seinfeld, or you know, that's all there is. There were no positions open, and there was a publicity assistant position open. And, and I, you know, learned a little bit about that, as I was applying, and it started actually making a lot of sense, because I was still going to be, you know, an interesting interface with authors at a time when their books are really already developed. And, you know, ready to sort of present in the marketplace in to the media. And so that was a really interesting bridge of, you know, kind of positioning and managing perceptions of just, you know, what, what these books are, and what a project is.

Jennifer Yoffy 03:18

Kind of, like branding in a way.

Alan Rapp 03:21

Yeah, completely and, and, you know, the basics, like writing, writing press releases, which itself is a pretty, you know, daunting exercise, but a good skill to learn. And then, you know, following up with media people as you're sending them books, pitching them books, and at the same time, you know, I was an English major. And so I was interested in writing and started doing freelance writing for like, some of the music magazines, and some of the counterculture magazines like Boing Boing, when it was still a print zine. And you know, started hanging out with interesting people in the Bay Area, who would become the kind of like, not even the first wave. By the time I got there, it was maybe like a second or third wave of this, sort of like, technological utopians. And the founding editors of Wired Magazine, and that kind of thing. So I was, at the same time just trying to stay creative, you know, thinking like, my, my work is this one thing, and yes, I'm writing but it's, you know, I'm trying to keep my creative side over here and a bit of a sustained freelance practice. And so I wrote on and off for those years, and the same time I was just encountering people in projects that seemed like I mean, you know, by the time after a few years, I really understood the sensibility of Chronicle. And I started encountering, you know, some people and ideas that seemed like they could be adapted to books and started referring them to some editors at Chronicle, some mentors of mine, like Annie Barrows, who was managing part of the photography list in the 90s. And you know, there still was a kind of interesting, substantial photography list in Chronicle and other trade publishers at the time. So, you know, Joel Sternfeld, Sally Gall, Andrea Modica, like, those were some of the photographers that were being published by Chronicle. And so some of these projects that I was referring over actually started getting picked up. And, you know, I realized that maybe I did have that kind of editorial sensibility. And when, when Annie left, it seemed like maybe a good position for me to transition over to editorial. And in a kind of interesting way, in that I was not starting kind of conventionally like, as an editorial assistant, or like an intern, I was, you know, a little bit beyond that having already understood by then, now how the company works, and what the list really is, and where to go. So it didn't start as an assistant. But at the same time, I didn't really have a mentor. So I was kind of, like, thrown into this.

Jennifer Yoffy 06:22

Winging it.

Alan Rapp 06:23

Yeah, totally winging it. I made a lot of mistakes, and, but started, you know, kind of cultivating an interesting little list of my own that when it started getting into photography - some of these were inherited or referred over projects. You know, someone like the late great, Jim Marshall would not have been kind of like, you know, in my cohort at that time.

Jennifer Yoffy 06:50

Yeah. How did you so I mean, you were an English major, and you? How did you connect with photography and photographers? Like from the writing aspect to the visual?

Alan Rapp 07:01

Yeah, absolutely. Well, part of it was that the book selling job that I had in Los Angeles, or Santa Monica, more proper was Hennessy + Engels, which is a great art, design, architecture bookstore, and then on the Third Street promenade, the sort of flagship store. And that was my introduction to the world of visual books. And so I was kind of just getting into everything at that time. It was also a new arrangement in the early 90s, that Phaidon was getting distributed by Chronicle Books in the US. And so there was this new, kind of, like bigger world, at Chronicle of you know, this prestige, although kind of like, you know, reinventing itself at the time, art publisher, and so it was kind of, you know, getting closer to those books as well. And they, you know, over the term of the last few decades, the irony being that now, Monacelli were I'm editorial director is owned by Phaidon. So there was kind of like a long arc. But it was a kind of, you know, interest of mine on the side, I didn't really have training for it. But that that is, you know, school training, but then just working at such a, you know, uniquely visual publisher like Chronicle was itself like my, you know, education.

Jennifer Yoffy 08:35

Yeah, on the job...

Alan Rapp 08:37

Yeah.

Jennifer Yoffy 08:38

Of all the photo books you worked with, during your time at Chronicle, what, can you tell us about a couple of your favorite experiences and what made them so meaningful to you?

Alan Rapp 08:49

Yeah, absolutely. Um, some of these are with artists who I have continued to work with over the years. So, interesting, interesting details there. I got to know Elinor Carucci when she was developing her first body of work and was shopping it around, came into Chronicle as she was on a trip to San Francisco and you know, just really, you know, presented this at the time, you know, very daring, very bold but also just, you know, so personal and so intimate and kind of, you know, really personally accessible even for me as a you know, as man, but with the kind of, you know, universal access to these, you know, glimpses at these familial relationships, love partner relationships, and it was just, you know, incredibly striking and for me, you know, kind of a new generation was sort of, you know, in in her work was presenting itself and Elinor and I really hit it off.

Jennifer Yoffy 10:03

Yeah, has there ever been a more lovely human being than Elinor Carucci I've never heard anyone do anything other than gush about how wonderful she is, with good reason. She is amazing. And just and so open and accessible as an artist, as a person.

Alan Rapp 10:26

Very generous, a great friend. But also, you know, it's no surprise that she is like, an incredibly inspiring teacher, she inspires incredible loyalty to you know, her students and just, you know, people who work with her. And I think there was just, you know, something to be said, I mean, it's so tricky when it gets into art, and you're talking about, you know, the truth of photography, and that kind of, you know, is there, you know, can you even establish a sort of baseline of sort of philosophical truth in photography? I would, I would argue, no, and yet we, you know, I keep coming back to work that is this representation of real life that is, you know, feels, if it's not true, it's at least honest.

Jennifer Yoffy 11:17

Yes, yes, yes, yes.

Alan Rapp 11:18

And I think Elinor's work was helping, you know, articulate those kind of, you know, huge philosophical ideas really, in a way that I could personally interpret them. And you know, it just was a really great development and you know, in down to she loves collaborating on the level of the edit and the sequence with me, you know, I learned a lot just through that process. And, and so we debuted Closer as the body of work was published, in I believe, 1999. And I'm forgetting, not always great with memory and dates, but I think thats the case and then it, you know, really kind of did its own thing, it made its own impression in the photography book world at the time. And so we, you know, it was very proud to be able to bring that...

Jennifer Yoffy 12:20

Everyone was like that Alan Rapp is a genius. (laughs)

Alan Rapp 12:24

Then, you know, I mean, just one back story detail there is that, I presented it, and it was not immediately picked up. You know, I think it was perceived, rightly so I was like, this kind of bold, there's a lot of nudity in this book, there's nudity on, you know, I mean, ultimately, there was nudity on the cover. But, you know, it's it did make an impression, and it did not, you know, we didn't immediately pick it up, after a year, Elinor came back, and was further developing the work. And there was just a lot of evidence, I mean, you know, it was partly in the publishing, you know, scheme, you have to present not just the value of the artist in terms of the art is great, but just, you know, the position in the market. And, you know, commercially she was also getting interesting projects, and, you know, was represented, there was just more evidence that this is a young artist who is going to be going somewhere, and I've thought of this as we have the opportunity to publish the first book by this artist, and that's a distinction that never goes away, there's always, you know, the first book is always with a certain publisher. And so, you know, we could be part of that. And I think, after a year, it actually just made more sense to people. And I think that, you know, maybe there was just a little bit of a, you know, early seeding that kind of ultimately flowered. But that helped, I think, create a certain sensibility for more photography books at Chronicle that could do certain things. And it was, even if the subsequent projects were really nothing like it, you know, the other books that I went on to make with like, David Maisel his Library of Dust project, which is, you know, an incredibly striking and hard to encapsulate project of portraits of copper canisters that had human cremated remains from patients who were interred at a Portland, Oregon psychological hospital, and had been sort of, you know, no next of kin to pick up these remains and so they had been cremated and you know, kept in, in a vault or a room in these canisters for decades, and it started becoming public that there was this, you know, a scandal really that, you know, there were there were these conditions at the hospital and David accessed the hospital and made this very moving, very provocative body of work of just these canisters themselves, which had, over time, then subjected to water, humidity, and we're kind of like fluorescing, like, like batteries when they go bad. And so it's, again, hard to encapsulate. And, you know, think of things, you know, pity the the poor young editor who's about to present this project to an editorial board or editorial director. Right, or the person having to write the press release. Yeah, yeah. And the editorial director, I think, asked if I was trying to spiritually test her. It was a great response. But, you know, again, there was this kind of idea of making a, making a book out of some, you know, ineffable project that, you know, someone with real dedication envision was putting together and so that was, yeah, that kind of, you know, books like that helped me develop this sensibility of the kinds of books I would still continue to want to do today. And sometimes I have opportunities to.

Jennifer Yoffy 16:38

Yeah, and it's really fortunate that, you know, both David and Elinor had you as a advocate, because, again, it's the quick read would be this is too much, too hard, too challenging, potentially.

Alan Rapp 16:54

Potentially, I mean, again, as this, you know, the, the market transition, that was sort of a, you know, slow burn, also, in terms of, did visual trade publishers really want to keep doing those kinds of photography books, if they're, you know, hard to package, hard to sell, complicated to make, expensive to produce, higher price points, specialized audience, like all these things that are sort of counter to, you know, larger scale trade publishing wisdom, right?

Jennifer Yoffy 17:30

Absolutely. It's counter to all wisdom, actually. (laughs) All logic and reason.

Alan Rapp 17:36

Yeah, exactly. And so, yeah, I think think of yourself as a publisher and thinking, you know, all of the constraints and, you know, all the opportunities too, but you have to kind of have a certain, you know, dedicated method to justify going and going in these directions, right?

Jennifer Yoffy 17:59

Yeah, absolutely. So, kind of, to that point a little bit, you've seen the publishing industry change a lot during your time working in it. So what changes have you seen for the better and what have you seen for the worse?

Alan Rapp 18:15

Um, I mean, this is also not a novel factor. And, you know, we, we deal with it in the, the artists that we, you know, know, and are friendly with and talk to, and work with all the time, but the kind of, you know, real viability in the rise of self publishing, is something that I think, is, you know, it's still, even though it's not new, it's still kind of feels new, in a way. And artists are doing, you know, continue to kind of, like, do different things with it in terms of not hewing to conventions or formats, or, you know, and going in pretty interesting directions.

Jennifer Yoffy 18:59

It's like, it's not new, but it's, it's becoming more and more validated, and kind of the rules are getting more broken, I guess, for lack of a better, you know, like, there's the boundaries are getting pushed in a very exciting and acceptable way.

Alan Rapp 19:18

Absolutely. And then, you know, but the, the thing that is tricky about that is just the atomization within the market of you know, how how can you get, you know, with with our attention spans shot as they are for so many reasons these days, you know, how do you keep on top of some of some of this, and where do you go especially, I mean, you know, pandemic is obviously a factor in all things, but, you know, what are the ways in which we can encounter this work? That, especially if you know, you don't, you don't live, for example, in a city with an annual art book fair or Canada, right? So I think those are some of the changes that are amazing and, and just the, you know, access and availability to printing and publishing technologies and platforms is great, as well. But, you know, there again, the downside is that there's something to be said for the kind of like, you know, classical model, the traditional model of artists who are publishing through publishers with an editor or collaborating to a degree, even collaborating with a designer who knows their way around as, you know, production and, and publishing and packaging. So there's, there's not always the kind of grounding for artists to know, just, you know, how to begin, what to do. And maybe and maybe that's pretty cool, like, just DIY and, and punk rock. And that can result in really interesting projects, too. But, you know, there again, you see, sometimes someone who could use a partner or a guidance on what it is to edit and sequence and what the conventions and history of the dimensions are, and books and why certain things are the way they are, which themselves, you know, are you know, not superfluous often. So I think I've mentioned to you I had done some workshops with, with some artists that I was working with, like, David, and like Elinor and Cig Harvey, and Jen Davis, on, on these collaborations between an editor and an artist, because I thought that would be a kind of valuable workshop where people don't always hear from the publishing side.

Jennifer Yoffy 21:57

Right, right. More from the designer, if anything, yeah.

Alan Rapp 22:02

And, you know, a lot of photography pedagogy is taught by other photographers, and that is also valuable when those photographers have publishing experience. But, you know, I was just kind of inserting myself in the photographers realm, as a kind of, you know, there are some other things you might benefit from learning. And those were, you know, those were always really valuable for me, too, it was getting exposed to interesting and some amazing photographers, and just, you know, learning a lot through the exposure to more work in that context. So I always loved those.

Jennifer Yoffy 22:38

Yeah, I'm sure it was super helpful. What do you feel like you brought to the table in that situation? Like, what are some of the things that a photographer might not or, you know, someone looking to publish their work might not know, that would be helpful to hear from the publishing side?

Alan Rapp 22:59

I mean, just, in some cases, a little bit more of prompting students or these photographers to get into the conventions a little more and, and ask themselves, What is going on? And, you know, it's a really basic exercise. I mean, we all have our favorite books, we have our favorite photography books. Can you explain what exactly it is about this book that is, you know, making it one of your favorites.

Jennifer Yoffy 23:34

Right, what's working for you.

Alan Rapp 23:35

Some of that is kind of, you know, people not seeing immediately, which is, you know, itself a function of good design is like, design that you don't totally notice, but sometimes it's a kind of function of the graphic design or production elements, or just, you know, the, just seeing a very basic, but really, you know, tight sequence and relationships. Inner relationships between images and thinking in terms of a book spread to, you know, two pages, even if it's a single image. You know, thinking of thinking of like different units, like the spread is the way you see a book as opposed to the page. So I mean, really, kind of, not, not to say this negatively, but some kind of, you know, really remedial stuff in a way that is just a grounding in a process of seeing books as their own kind of genre, you know, in a way, kind of like as their own technology and just looking at the different factors that you can kind of know, and sliders that create different effects within that technology. (Sirens can be heard in the audio) Is someone getting `murdered out there? No, I'm sorry it's just Wednesday in Brooklyn.

Jennifer Yoffy 25:01

What is happening? (laughs) Do you need to take cover?

Alan Rapp 25:06

No, I barely hear it. But is probably like mega amplified on your system.

Jennifer Yoffy 25:12

No, I lived in Boston after college and my last apartment was right on Mass Ave. And the first couple of weeks like my roommates, and I could not sleep, I mean, it just the stuff that would happen in the middle of the night. And by the end, like, there were like cars on fire outside and, you know, explosions and like, slept through the whole thing. So I can appreciate that.

Alan Rapp 25:35

Yeah, no, it's adaptation. I, one of my one of my least lovely apartments in college was in the flight path of LAX. You know, it's crazy how fast you can just start thinking of that as normal, it would be on the phone with someone and they were like, What the hell was that?

Jennifer Yoffy 25:56

You're like, what are you talking about?

Alan Rapp 25:57

Yeah.

Jennifer Yoffy 26:01

So apologies. So what have you seen for the worse in terms of the publishing industry? Like changes that have made it more challenging, either from a publisher's perspective or from the artists perspective? Or both?

Alan Rapp 26:21

Oh, it's, you know, it's a good question that there was the transition of overall fewer photography books being published with trade publishers who had numerous categories, you know, so and even not to, like, live back in the 90s, or something, but the landscape was that, you know, Abrams, and Chronicle and Little, Brown and, you know, there were a number of publishers who were killed off even, you know, who had interesting sort of active photography lists. And I think over time, they just were not emphasized, I understand it, all the pressure is that you and I just, you know, kind of recounted meant that those lists just shrunk and you know, the rest of the lists got as commercial as possible. For better or worse, again, I totally understand the market terms, I'm not trying to be a snob about that. But, you know, it's a really good thing that the rise of, you know, self publishing, and, you know, and platforms did arise when they did, because there were, there was a real kind of vacuum going on,

Jennifer Yoffy 27:46

Right. Well, and also like, small, independent presses. But then they have another flip side of where, you know, if you have a large publisher, like Chronicle where they can make up maybe a financial deficit in the photography department, in another area, a small independent photo book publisher, this is it. And a lot of the photographers are bearing the weight of, you know, the financial risk.

Alan Rapp 28:17

That's right. Yeah, I mean, in that, and that was a kind of, you know, once upon a time, I think, all authors, including photographers, expected advances, for example, and you know...

Jennifer Yoffy 28:30

Ahh, thats adorable. (laughs)

Alan Rapp 28:31

I know, right? And that's really flipped over over the decades. And so, you know, you've got this kind of self subsidizing it's not, you know, there's a, there's a model built in there where, yes, it makes sense to offset production costs and all that and you know, it, but it, it is hard on, on photographers to be able to bear that burden.

Jennifer Yoffy 29:00

For sure.

Alan Rapp 29:01

Or, or make it that they're established enough that they have gallery representation or partnerships where, you know, some of those books or a significant portion of those print runs is actually accounted for through purchase or buyback. So it is, you know, it's forced photographers to get more savvy on that stuff necessarily. But you know, they, but they have to bear a lot of the you know, they need more skills in order to bear all that really. And funding is always a question, it's always tricky when you're talking about money and, you know, the, the, some of the artists that I've worked with consistently or you know, at least several times over the years, like, including, you know, Jona Frank, who's really interesting hybrid, sort of, you know, photographic memoir, we published last late last year. Yeah, it's so great. It's such a fun book. Thank you. Yeah, that's just to, for the, for the value of, you know, for the audience's sake, it's Cherry Hill – A Childhood Reimagined. And, you know, to, to be able to pull off a book that has a lot of intensive production and a high page count too, which is not right. You know, some of that it's some of these projects just don't, they don't belong, in a sense. Because the fact you know, the production factors kind of outweigh what an individual can do in a sort of self publishing context, right? So we, you know, there's still this, I think, valuable role for, for publishers, you're more, you know, art and design architectural oriented publishers, like, like Monacelli. But anyway, you know, the larger arc that I think I was just describing as a kind of, you know, retrenching of the multi category, trade publishers. And, you know, pushing, pushing art and photography books into more specialized art and photography publishers, right, or self publishing. And so that's the big kind of, like, you know, landscape shift. And maybe, you know, there's always the rise of I mean, again, I've been, I've been doing publishing so long, it's like, do you remember when the big retail panic was the, you know, the rise of the big box stores and the demise of the indies, right? And then now, like, big box stores are not even, you know, compared to compared to Amazon, which really accounts for almost a half of the books that any given title that we will sell, the biggest customer is Amazon right? I know, its... So you notice that.

Jennifer Yoffy 32:07

Yes, I do, and I know, the $4 per book I get from there.

Alan Rapp 32:15

Yeah, exactly. You know, and being the mega mega, you know, they set the absolute terms that everyone from the big publishers to the small one has to just go along with. So it is just a monopolized market now. And it's still great that you can get photography books, somehow, right?

Jennifer Yoffy 32:37

Yeah, I mean, somehow, I mean, it's interesting, because so these bigger publishers kind of lost their photo section, but all these small independent ones have come up. And they're more likely to publish lesser known artists, because they don't, you know, I do sometimes print runs of 300. You know, so there's a lot less risk involved. And so in a way, I mean, this shift has, it makes no sense financially, and it kind of never has, and yet there more photo books being published than ever because there's just a bunch of psychos like me. (laughs)

Alan Rapp 33:18

Exactly. (laughs)

Jennifer Yoffy 33:19

Let's do it. We'll figure it out later.

Alan Rapp 33:23

Yeah. And that's, I mean, but that's so valuable, as you know, I mean, you know, obviously, like, you yourself would understand that what you're doing has that kind of justification, but it is really valuable, that there's just small, active hotspots of publishing because it makes a difference.

Jennifer Yoffy 33:43

Yeah. What kind of photography books would you like to see more of out in the world.

Alan Rapp 33:49

Um, you know, on the personal level, I have weirder tastes than what I am, you know, necessarily overseeing in the kind of editorial publishing role, like, I, I like pictures of, you know, static objects, and there's something about that kind of contemplation of our, of the world around us that somehow just is more mysterious and interesting to me than kind of like conventional portraiture, if that makes sense. So like, like your book on If You Go, All the Plants Will Die, I love it. So good, right. So that's a you know, but what I want to see more out there, I mean, I've been thinking about this in the context of just obviously, because it's, you know, sometimes in the back of my mind, and now just more and more on the front of your mind, like just all the emergencies that we're dealing with. And looking at some artists who are dealing with I mean, it's, you know, it's it's not like, aesthetically satisfying to, you know, in a sense, like, look at art that is dealing with these sort of climate, political and social emergencies. But we're, you know, you got to look at it. And so you know, I've been thinking about some of the some of the, some of the artists who in their own ways are making really interesting sometimes very conceptual, that you know, important work about, about climate change. And wondering, in some senses, you know, sometimes these are hard to adapt to book form and so I don't totally know how to do it or, or anything, but you know, there's a Bozeman, Montana photographer, Ian van Coller who...

Jennifer Yoffy 35:57

Oh, yeah.

Alan Rapp 35:58

Yeah, who I mean, just beyond really amazing field work, and, you know, working on kind of like the dissipating glaciers around the world, but there's this really interesting kind of multimedia project where he teams with scientists, and, you know, writes over and sort of data analyzes over his photographs. And it's called, I think it's the Naturalist of the Long Now and it's a, you know, that's a, that's a project that is just so interesting to me, and so multi dimensional, and I think, you know, can help people think a little less literally about just, you know, the climate panic, that we're that we're all feeling actually needs a pretty sophisticated kind of aesthetic evolution. Right. And so, then thinking a bit in, in those terms. And, and just yeah, I mean, you know, working with artists who have are analyzing the, you know, interesting avenues of representation, representation of self and social, and, and their social positions. So, you know, trying to pay attention to that, and these are such, evolved, like, quickly evolving fields that realizing I have a lot of kind of, like catching up to do so that that's part of it. Yeah, I mean, in your position, you kind of, you know, I have a similar question for you, when it comes to it, I mean, you make your own publishing decisions too.

Jennifer Yoffy 37:40

I do. Yeah, it's not such a harsh committee, I have to go up against.

Alan Rapp 37:44

Yeah. But, you know, how do you how do you factor in these, like, massive changes that are that are all around us?

Jennifer Yoffy 37:53

In terms of which books I am choosing to publish? Or how do I feel about the whole industry?

Alan Rapp 38:02

I mean, just, you know, in the sense of how, what, what is the publishers role or responsibilities sometimes, and, you know, it's hard to paint with such a broad brush, and I'd like, you know, saying something is kind of sweeping, but also vague as, like social equity. But, you know, when it comes to what we can do as sort of, you know, allies or partners in artists, you know, how do we how do you see a role sometimes when it comes to that?

Jennifer Yoffy 38:35

Yeah, that's a great question. I feel like I started in publishing, because I was working with so many photographers, when I owned my gallery, and then like, through the nonprofit, and workshops and things like that, that had really wonderful projects, and were paying an exorbitant amount of money to certain publishers to get them published in a way that I felt was taking advantage of the artists and and that sucks. So, you know, in a similar way, with the gallery, I was trying to figure out ways to help artists just kind of level the playing field so that you know, the good work rises to the top, not just the people that have $50,000 to pay a publisher to publish the work. But again, the challenges, the financial suck, you know, so like, how can you elevate great work and try to put that financial piece to the side. It's just a constant. It's a constant struggle. And I think, you know, fortunately with crowdfunding has been a great avenue for people and and doesn't have any in my opinion, this stigma that it maybe did in the beginning, it's kind of like, it's a way to pre order the book and help make it happen. And it also kind of validates that there is an audience for it, that there's enough people that are interested in buying it to warrant the production of it. And I think so just being creative and, and for me, I've had a challenge all along in how, like what metric I'm gonna use to decide what books to make. And I kind of had this epiphany recently, because normally, I'm like, there are a couple of things that I'm looking at. One is, do I really love this artist, like as a person, because you're going to be partnering with them for well over a year, they're going to be a very active person in your life and texting you at 10 o'clock on a Saturday night, and you have to enjoy this human. So I always say like, I have a no asshole rule, which, you know, like, at least that's the short. Exactly. And then it's, you know, is it work that I think is unique or important, and I have the my catalog is, it's pretty big tent, you know, there's a wide range. And it was similar in my gallery at a really I like a lot of different types of work. So, you know, my art collection is as diverse as my gallery catalog, you know, roster was in my publishing catalog. So, to me, there's a lot of factors that go into that piece, you know, do I think the work is interesting, do I think it's something that I haven't necessarily seen before, I haven't seen it done in a certain way, or I have an idea for a way we can present it in book form that would be really unique and kind of elevated as an object. And then the financials have to make some sort of sense. So, you know, can we do crowdfunding his does this person have collectors that are, you know, can we can do a portfolio sale situation is there, do they have grant funding, because again, at the end of the day, I'm just, you know, it's my really expensive, full time, hobby. You know, I have a full time job that allows me to have a full time, other job that doesn't, you know, pay any money and hopefully doesn't lose too much. And so, what I ultimately realized recently, too, is that, for me, personally, I need to get something personally out of it, you know, I'm putting a ton of my time and energy and basically, you know, all of my free time, and if I was, if I loved playing golf, I wouldn't play anymore. If it wasn't, if I wasn't getting something out of it, right? You know, it's not just about like, Oh, I want to make sure that this golf course stays in business. And you know, that my caddy is that the person that holds the clubs, you know, so yeah, like, has a job, um, you know, like, I need to enjoy it, too. So I realized that for me, personally, the books that I get the most out of are ones that I really feel like I learned something from whether it's, you know, a really like conceptually deep project that is pulling me in and giving me a perspective on something that I didn't think about before, and that I can, by publishing it, I'm really getting involved in a much deeper way, if I have an opportunity to work on the edit and sequence and design, especially if it's a little bit unique. You know, that's another way, if I have an opportunity to, you know, sometimes I co publish with other publishers or I use designers that are outside of my normal, you know, network, and so I get pulled in, in those conversations. And I learned a lot through that. So, to me, I recently was like, that really needs to be a huge component, you know?

Alan Rapp 44:13

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that. And what you're saying about just the value of these relationships is, you know, some, some of these artists are really, really close friends, too. Absolutely. Yeah. I think it's you know, it's great to work with friends whose work you love. It can, you know, there are certainly pitfalls like you know, it sucks to talk money with friends as well. But I think over you know, just over time, this sort of mutual understanding that we have makes, ultimately just makes the book as good as it can be. And no one wants to have the opportunity to make a book that is sort of just, you know, what we would think of as a kind of like, a traditional exhibition catalog or something. I mean, there's...

Jennifer Yoffy 45:11

Absolutely, yeah.

Alan Rapp 45:12

There's so many more ideas that the artist can bring into every facet of the book from the text contributors, if that if that is a thing in in one of these books, the design and the production that, you know, there's just that level of collaboration is so important. On the artistic level, and then it makes, it just makes a better book, you know?

Jennifer Yoffy 45:36

AbsoluAbsolutely and if they're not going to collaborate, then they may as well self publish.

Alan Rapp 45:40

Yeah.

Jennifer Yoffy 45:41

Because they're not, bringing your expertise, you know, they're not open to other ideas, then, you know, what's the point in collaborating with a publisher?

Alan Rapp 45:52

Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Excellent. Point. Um, you know, something else about the question you asked about the changing landscape. And again, it's kind of curious about your response to this, too, is sort of like, you know, wasn't there kind of like a golden era of the portfolio review? You know, like, I'm, I met you in Boston, and yeah, for a while there, it was, like, Santa Fe, Portland, Houston, like, there, you know, and, and then it seemed like, there were even more and there again, was it kind of, you know, diffusing a little bit in terms of the effects of that, and it felt more pay to play over time.

Jennifer Yoffy 46:38

Yeah, I think that's a really great analogy to the publishing thing, too. So yeah, so it's kind of like, back in the day, in the Golden Age, you know, era of portfolio reviews, there were these couple of, you know, there was Santa Fe, which is like, you know, Steidel, or, you know, like you had these, these reviews, and they, they were hard to get into, and they meant something and the reviewers were able to give real opportunities. And then yeah, it's like every, just more and more photo festivals were popping up around the country, and they all had portfolio reviews, and every, like art center was doing a portfolio review. And, and yeah, I think, for me, I stopped doing them for probably four or five years because I was just seeing the same work over and over, and I was seeing the people that could really afford to go to them tended to be, I don't mean this to sound disparaging in any way. But like, you know, a retired dentist who found photography, like later in life and was photographing floral arrangements or you know, which were lovely, but not the kind of work that I was getting benefit from connecting with. So yeah, I, you know, I love giving feedback on work, any type of work at any level, but in terms of, was it worth my time as a publisher to go, you know, I wasn't finding book projects from doing it. So it was more like, a community service, you know?

Alan Rapp 48:17

Yeah, that all sounds very familiar. And there was, you know, there was great work, but it it did sort of, you know, the character changed over time. And, you know, I'm wondering if the pandemic just blew a hole in that industry too.

Jennifer Yoffy 48:39

Well now, so I did, so part of it too, was for me, personally, you know, I have a full time job. So I was like, am I going to use my vacation days in my full time job to go work for free at a portfolio review? No. For free like, okay, you will give me a flight and hotel, and then I need to work for you for eight hours a day while I'm there. So that also didn't make any sense. But with the pandemic, a ton of these reviews have gone online. And I was participating, I participated in several of those and it was interesting um, you know, there's not like the super awesome camaraderie and hanging out at the hotel bar at the end and then you know, like, you're not meeting the other reviewers except in the like, combined Zoom Room, you know, (laughs) so weird. But it was an interesting way to kind of feed that piece for me that I do enjoy, like giving photographers feedback. But um, yeah, I mean, I don't know what's gonna happen.

Alan Rapp 49:48

Yeah, I've done a few virtual ones like a you know, ICP and there's a, there's a, there is a value in a sense or a kind of like, you know, modernizing upgrade to a virtual portfolio review and that like, you know, over time, I mean, for me, I'm not a gallerist so I don't need to see the prints, but the whole white glove treatment literally it's not always the kind of like right approach when we were in this sort of, you know, fairly rapid fire sort of situation. And I think we're also, I mean, you know, this is still why books are so great like staring at your screens the whole time and seeing an image, like that is obviously really different to the, you know, physical translation of a printed book, but, you know, we're used to it, we can do it, we can do it in an edit context, we can do it in a review context. So, you know, that's nice, but certainly the kind of, I mean, obviously, like, the social factor, as you describe was, was great. And, you know, there were good panels and stuff, but it didn't seem like they necessarily, I don't know, if they hold if they all hold up today.

Jennifer Yoffy 51:12

Yeah, and I do, I agree. And I think to like in the online portfolio reviews, they become more accessible again, so for the photographer, because you have to pay to participate in the review period, you know, like, however many hundreds of dollars, but normally, they would also have to fly to a place and pay for hotel, and print out their portfolio, and bring, you know, and create some sort of clever leave behind to give to you, so that at the end, I had a heavy bag full of things. And so if you strip away all of those expenses, it does make it a lot more accessible. And so I did feel like I was seeing more interesting work. And I'm actually, you know, I'm publishing someone who lives in Poland, who I met from a portfolio review that would never have been able to fly to the US to sit down for 20 minutes at a time with reviewers. So, um, so yeah, there are some really good benefits from it, I think.

Alan Rapp 52:16

Yeah, so I mean, some some of this question is, you know, finding, finding the people on the projects that we publish, right. And I think, you know, some of that, for me, the project has been a little bit one of visibility, and, you know, not just making a book that, like, gets a lot of media or sells a lot, or something. I mean, we were very fortunate this year to public, I finally got to work with Cig Harvey, as you know, and, you know, someone who I think I met, if I'm not mistaken, in Santa Fe, and was just immediately taken with her work. And, you know, she published her first few books, with Schilt in, in the Netherlands, and great books. And, you know, when I was finally in a position of Monacelli to start doing photography books again, and starting, you know, not starting with but again, you know, reuniting with Elinor to publish the Midlife book, and, you know, really very proud to have had the opportunity to do that, because it's really important work, and I think really resounded with with an audience. And, you know, ironically enough, that body of work was not that easy for her to get attention for in terms of a book proposal from other publishers. And I was finally like, why don't we just do this?

Jennifer Yoffy 53:51

And the press, the press for that book was insane.

Alan Rapp 53:56

I think, you know, the, the kind of, like, complete validation of her of her thesis of sustained, you know, self exploration and, and just, you know, kind of grappling with the kind of, you know, the the day to day and the metaphysics of this stage in people's life, and certainly in my life where, I don't know if you know, this, Elinor and I are day apart in age, so we always, like, the shared journey.

Jennifer Yoffy 54:26

Awwww, yeah. But you're saying Cig Harvey...

Alan Rapp 54:29

Yeah, but then just kind of like the visibility that I was talking about is the kind of, and you know, this was something of the project. You know, years ago at Chronicle is kind of like building a list that, again, as you're saying is diverse. But, you know, has a has a viewpoint and yeah, you know, in a sense, who the idealized audience is for, for these books, and you make the books in a certain way that that do resonate. And so, to be able to have a you know, a nice you know, again, Cig has a following that is really strong and doing Blue Violet was such a pleasure.

Jennifer Yoffy 55:13

Cig has a following that is like manic. The people, the people love her, I do, too. I mean, I did a podcast with her, it's got like, twice as many listens as like any other, you know, as like the second highest one. And, yeah, the triptych sold out right away. And I was like, so we're just gonna change my whole business model to be like, I'm only publishing Cig Harvey books, and she is a fucking delight. She is just sunshine. It's amazing.

Alan Rapp 55:54

Absolutely. And so, you know, just to, to slowly build a list that, you know, consists of Elinor and Jona Frank and Cig Harvey, and, you know, we'll, we'll just see where that goes. And also in, you know, this is particular to my tastes as well. But you know, always I work on a lot of architecture books, I love architectural photography, like, you know, and, and land art. And we just had this lovely catalog, co published with the Nevada Museum of Art coinciding with their exhibition by Gianfranco Gorgoni, Land Art photographs, and completely different scale and everything that we're talking in terms of, obviously, more like, you know, rooted day to day, observational, you know, intimate photographers, but I also love that stuff, too. And just, you know, the...

Jennifer Yoffy 56:53

Yeah it seems like Monacelli is where, like, you have that range.

Alan Rapp 56:58

We have the, you know, this is the, if I don't, I don't want to say, you know, underdog is kind of a stupid word. But, you know, when, when you are in a position where everyone is, you know, trying to figure out why we're doing what we're doing, and how we do it, we have a lot of opportunity there. I mean, it's just it, you know, we're a nearly 30 year old company that people think of as mainly an architecture publisher, but if you look at the, there's, there's a lot of diversity in the list, too. And, you know, we're not one of like, the, the huge publishers, so we have opportunities to do these books with personality, and then the, the task is always to find, you know, find the ways that they can connect with, with the audience. So selling is always the, you know, the trick too.

Jennifer Yoffy 58:02

Yeah, the bummer part. (laughs)

Alan Rapp 58:06

You know, but like you're saying, it was like the, the, the books themselves, the artists, you know, that there's, there's substance, there are ideas, that are well produced, they're design forward and they have a kind of, you know, aura around them that people want to get close to it. I mean, it's starting to get a little metaphysical, I get it, but you know, there's kind of a transformation of these static images to kind of, you know, physical object that, that really, you know, it's a great, it's a process, it's amazing to participate in, and I think, consumers audience, you know, feel that integrity when they get to these books. So I just want to keep trying to, you know, make make them right, in that sense.

Jennifer Yoffy 59:08

I remember, and I believe this is correct. You have a tattoo on your wedding finger.

Alan Rapp 59:14

Mmhmm, yup.

Jennifer Yoffy 59:16

And so it's like a ring tattooed on your finger. And I have thought about that.

Alan Rapp 59:23

And my wife has her tattoo.

Jennifer Yoffy 59:26

And I've thought about that for years and how ballsy that is and awesome, like the conviction of not only getting married but getting it tattooed and have been so pleased that the marriage is working out.

Alan Rapp 59:44

Well, thank you.

Jennifer Yoffy 59:45

But I mean, I was married when we met, I got divorced. I was thinking, I'm so glad I don't have a tattoo on my finger.

Alan Rapp 59:53

Mmmhhmm, I know.

Jennifer Yoffy 59:54

But, I think that I also think I knew ahead of time, that wouldn't be the best idea.

Alan Rapp 59:59

Well, I mean, that makes sense and you know it's certainly a commitment even more than the one you're supposed to be making in the act of getting married right but that's that's supposed to be a lifelong thing and and I think we knew when we met that this this was going to be this is going to be it and of course life happens and you know there's ups and downs and we have a nine year old and everything but yeah, I never I never never have second thoughts on this ring. I think I think we're needing to kind of get it enhanced because next year is the 20th anniversary.

Jennifer Yoffy 1:00:41

Wow!

Alan Rapp 1:00:42

Yeah. So, Jen sends her best as well.

Jennifer Yoffy 1:00:46

Tell her I said hi.

Alan Rapp 1:00:47

And I hope we can...

Jennifer Yoffy 1:00:50

Oh, I know. I'm hoping to get to New York soon. It's been a year and a half.

Alan Rapp 1:00:55

Oh, yeah, of course. I hope we can connect.