One Planet

Several of my photos are featured in Nicolas Hulot's latest work, One Planet. Hulot is not well know in this country but he is France's leading celebrity-ecologist. He's even got his own foundation.

Published by Harry N. Abrams (my publisher) in the United States and La Martinière (parent of Abrams) in France (as La Terre en Partage,) this large coffee table book includes photos from other well-know photographers including Giles Martin and Steve Bloom. By the way, Abram's new Web site does not look good. La Martinière's site is even worse. It amazes me how publishers go nuts about book design but when it comes to Web design they seem clueless. Good design is good design. Period.

From Publishers Weekly

In an effort to reawaken our consciousness of the environment, this hefty volume offers text about and photographs (taken by a team of more than 20 nature photographers) of eight modern ecosystems: oceans, deserts, grasslands, polar regions, wetlands, mountains, forests and cities. Including pictures portraying the beauty of the natural world as well as images of its destruction, French nature writer Hulot and the foundation bearing his name succeed in emphasizing humans' not always salubrious influence on biodiversity, from sea snails of the ocean floor to the common city rat.

The photographs"whether stunning or shocking, like that of a gory fish market in Tokyo and one of a stork trapped in a plastic bag are much more effective for Hulot's environmental project than the brief, condemning text, characterized by words like "selfish," "pitiful," "pathetic" and "sickening."

The juxtaposition of clichéd images (a clownfish in a sea anemone and an otter floating on its back) with those of a rusted ship hulk marooned in the desert, circular hollows used to collect salt in Niger and an aerial view of crop irrigation offers an innovative picture of modern ecosystems. With more than 300 full-color pages, this volume offers a look into the near and far reaches of the world, which share the common consequences of an advancing human population. (July)

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