Catherine Leutenegger – Kodak City

Photographer: Catherine Leutenegger (born & resides in Switzerland)

Publisher: Kehrer Verlag (Germany)

Essays: Catherine Leutenegger, A.D. Coleman, Joerg Bader, and Urs Stahel

Text: English & French

Hardcover book with printed paper belly-band, sewn binding, four-color lithography, printed in Germany

Photobook designer: Chris Gautschi

Notes: In this documentary style investigation of a US city that has been economically hit hard due to a global shift in technology, which is all that more poignant for photographers, as this city is Rochester, NY, aka Kodak City. The digitization of photography probably has not had more of negative impact (pun intended) than on Kodak, a company that has recently lived through bankruptcy, and all of those who depended on it for their livelihood. Of course the irony is that scientist at Kodak created the digital technology in the mid-1970’s, but they were so welded to film, paper and chemicals, that the Kodak executives keep this novel technology hidden under the covers until it was too late. Leutenegger started her project in 2007 when the photographic wind had already shifted, then returned back again in 2012 to observe the lingering effects. Thus this is also a photobook project that investigates the process of photography and asks open ended questions of what is next for image making.

Cheers