- Paperback: 238 pages
- Publisher: From Here to Fame (Nov 2004)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 3937946055
- ISBN-13: 978-3937946054
- Product Dimensions: 30.1 x 22.4 x 1.7 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 2,955,278 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
As the name suggests this is photography archive of Marther Cooper, one of the few respected photographers who documented hiphop how it was. She covers everything in hip hop culture, from graffiti to breaking. The book documents the then 'up and comming' ledgends like, Donid White, Jean Michel Basquiat, Crazy Legs, Dj Kool Herc, Duro, Fab 5 Freddy, Grandmaster Flash, Iz the Wiz, Lady Pink, Rock Steady Crew and Run DMC to name a few. This book has almost everyone. This is a must have for anyone with any intrest on life in the early 1980's of New York. The Fashion, The Style, The People, this book has it. Its for people who know very little and what to know more and those who know-it-all and want to reminisce about the early days. There are very few books out there which capture all aspects of hip hop culture in the early 80's, if your only going to get one book on it, make sure you get this.
Format:Hardcover
Graffiti art has seen a revival of late. In Melbourne, Nike commissioned several graffiti artists to illustrate cartoony characters in an ambient media tie-in to its "You're Faster Than You Think" TV campaign. In October of 2004, Spiewalk streetwear hosted a gallery exhibition in which a dozen artists - many of them clearly inspired by graffiti or graffiti artists themselves - designed one-of-a-kind parka jackets that were subsequently posted on eBay for a charity auction. That same month, The New York Times Magazine wrote an article about the Web site woostercollective.com, which is a showcase for street art. So what better time than for Martha Cooper, the pioneer (along with Henry Chalfant) of graffiti photojournalism, to throw in her two cents, or subway tokens for that matter. But rather than simply come out with outtakes of her and Chalfant's seminal book "Subway Art" (Thames & Hudson, London), Cooper was clever enough to expand on the graffiti scene in the aptly titled "Hip Hop Files: Photographs 1979 - 1984."
In it, Cooper (along with interviews by Akim Walta) entertainingly chronicles the course of the hip hop movement of the late seventies and early eighties: the graffiti artists; break dancers; hip hop DJs and MCs; the influence of graffiti on the downtown Manhattan art scene; graffiti's transition onto canvas; main media coverage of hip hop; and hip hop's influence on fashion and culture. The photographs are accompanied by interviews, mostly with the participants themselves, which are spoken in a dialect as colourful as the graffiti that dominated the New York City trains of that era.
A large portion of the book is devoted to break dancers, MCs and DJs, which is difficult to capture, in spirit, on paper. Cooper acknowledges this in one chapter ("You have to hear rapping and you have to listen to somebody spinning records") but, even so, the photographs in question don't have the photojournalistic dynamism and artistic merit of a Mary Ellen Mark, Eugene Richards or Larry Fink, which would have helped enliven the acrobatic skills and spinning turntables. Still, "Hip Hop Files" manages to achieve what no other hip hop based book has done to date: to unite the whole of the movement into one coherent package. And that alone makes "Hip Hop Files" worth the fare.
(This book review originally appeared in "Lürzer's International Archive" magazine, Volume 6, 2004)
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
10 reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
This is REAL Hip Hop!!!!!
28 Nov 2005
Format:Hardcover
Being from this era,this book brings back a ton of great memories.The photos in this book are amazing,so crisp and vibrant.It doesn't seem like it was 2o+ years ago.This book will explain to you what is REAL HIP HOP(MCing,Breaking,Graffit},NOT the garbage they consider Hip Hop today.Looking at these photos it's hard to believe how young we were.Seeing old friends and classmates put a big smile on my face knowing that WE were there when it all started!GREAT book Marty!!!!!!
16 of 22 people found the following review helpful
IS MARTHA COOPER THE ORGINAL QUEEN OF HIP HOP?
7 Feb 2005
Format:Hardcover
Indeed, the handsome Book "the Hip-Hop Files: Photographs, 1979-1984" by Martha Cooper serves as a an open and closed door to what seemed a trend to many documentarians during the late 70's and early 80's. It isn't no coinsidence that Coopers photographs document Graffiti art during a period when the NY Art World was exploiting Urban aerosal artists. It is also very clear that she stopped documenting Graffiti when the "trend" ended in 1985. Though Coopers work documents a moment in time when aerosal art was King and Hip Hop was not yet a corporate advertisement, she does come off as an outsider/tourist when asked about documenting Graffiti, "I'm sure wildlife photographers feel the same way" about photographing animals when they run around. There is also the claim, by her publisher and graff-artists that she was the first photographer to document the origins of Hip-Hop. Jamell Shabazz's book "Back in The Days" never made such a claim nor did it need the fanfare that Coopers book fabricated. Jamell Shabazz,like Debra willis, Martin Chambi and James VanDerZee, documented a personal life and environment in New York before and after the trend came and went. Something to keep in mind!
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Fabulous resource
12 Aug 2005
Format:Hardcover
I lived in NYC in the 70's and 80's and witnessed the rise of subway graffiti and the beginnings of break dancing. This book brings it all back -- in a GOOD way. Reading it, you can understand why poor urban kids went to such lengths to make a mark for themselves. No one cared at first but Martha Cooper, who earned their respect and documented their achievements with her fine photographs. This book is a monument to those unsung teenage artists and the photographer who recognized and publicized their talents.
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