Magazine and book collector
Rachel: So would you say this is still one of your favorite issues? That’s what really got me I was finding material I knew didn’t exist anywhere else, and that’s kind of what got me caught up in this whole thing. There were tons of pictures in the magazines that I hadn’t seen anywhere else-weren’t in any books, weren’t in any of the anthologies. I felt that by collecting the issues, I had this great collection of work that I could otherwise never afford. It wasn’t just the great covers that were important, but so much more. In the course of looking for this, I found a lot of other things and realized how significant they were for me. I started looking for this issue, thinking ‘I really need to have the whole thing, why did I not keep the whole thing? How could I have torn it up?’ It proved to be really difficult to find. I put it up in almost every apartment I was in, every dorm room. Tearing the cover up, tearing out pages I really liked, push-pinning them to the wall. It was something that I kind of latched onto, it was a fetish item. It was Avedon’s 20th anniversary at Harper’s Bazaar, and it was this really pop-art issue with the Beatles, Jasper Johns, Jean Shrimpton-just this really wide-ranging look at pop culture, which I was completely caught up in during that moment. It’s the touchstone for me it was a significant magazine and it was an important issue. Rachel: You said in our last conversation that there’s this issue of Harper’s Bazaar that was one of your favorites. That would’ve been when I was in my early 20s. I never really had much money while I was in school, so once I came to New York and had my own apartment, I started writing about music and started collecting vinyl, and more casually, magazines and books. Vince: I couldn’t start really collecting until I resettled in New York in 1968 after college. I remember subscribing to House and Garden when I was like 13. Vince Aletti: I really started collecting as a kid. Rachel Cheung: What inspired all of your collections, whether it was your magazines or books? How old were you when you actively began growing them?
#MAGAZINE AND BOOK COLLECTOR HOW TO#
Document reconvened with the archivist to discuss appreciating print in 2020, offering tips on how to build an incredible collection that represents personal interests and reflects iconic cultural moments.
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There’s value in the physical and there’s value in the personal.
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The proliferation of digital publishing has led to ongoing conversation about the death of print, prompting questions around the efficacy of tangible goods.
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With a collection started in the 1970s, Aletti has overcome a dilemma most New Yorkers experience-wanting to keep things, but having nowhere to store them. His book Issues is a testament to his knowledge of print work, detailing a history of fashion magazine photography. As a writer, photography critic, and curator, Aletti’s expansive collection has surpassed the test of time. Towers of his print magazine collection are methodically stacked to create narrow alleyways of walking space. Mountains of books frame each end of the couch. Bookcases promptly greet visitors in the entryway of his East Village apartment. But as a collector for over 45 years, finding space for magazines is more of a labor of love than chore. The abundance of magazines I’ve accumulated has perpetuated a frustrating, neverending hunt for space, though this is nothing compared to the challenge Vince Aletti faces. The writer and champion of print media makes a compelling case for spending more time on eBay.Įvery Tuesday I pry open my mailbox to find The New Yorker waiting, warranting simultaneous pleasure and agony.