Photographs by Steve McCurry
The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám
Edward Fitzgerald's complete first (1859) edition
Introduction by John Stauffer
Edition of fifty copies
9 bound and 3 free-standing platinum prints, each signed*
11 x 14 inches
Handcrafted in New England
*This is the first time McCurry's work has been presented in platinum.
"Steve McCurry has given us the world through his iconographic image-making. He has been relentless in his pursuit of images that not only inform but sensitize us to places and people from faraway that are the D.N.A. of our planet. That he risks his life for us is of no concern to him. It is his way, an aspect of his pursuit of enduring art. That he is generous, compassionate, and humble is what drives this award-winning photographer and is what underlies his strength and the potency of his image-making.
McCurry is one of the best-known artists of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, and one of the most influential. His images have helped connect us to parts of the world we have never been to, humanizing our perceptions of people throughout the world.
But there is one image of McCurry’s that almost everyone knows, even if they don’t know who made it. We are referring, of course, to Sharbat Gula, Afghan Girl (1984). It is not too much to say that Afghan Girl has changed the world, “searing the heart” of viewers, owing to its power to inform our perception of humanity. For over thirty years, it has enabled millions of people to connect with another person across wide gulfs of cultural difference. It is this sense of connectedness, achieved through photography, that is McCurry’s great and rare gift to humanity."
- John Stauffer, from the introduction to Humanity