Iconic America: A Roller-Coaster Ride through the Eye-Popping Panorama of American Pop Culture
by Tommy Hilfiger, George Lois
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Book Summary Information
Author: George Lois, Tommy HilfigerEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2007-11-06
ISBN: 0789315734
Number of pages: 350
Publisher: Universe
Book Reviews of Iconic America: A Roller-Coaster Ride through the Eye-Popping Panorama of American Pop Culture
Book Review: Symbols of a perfect life
Summary: 5 Stars
Though the cover line refers to 'A roller-coaster ride through the eye-popping panorama of American pop culture' the book, fortunately, has a much further reach than just pop. With about four hundred subjects covered and obviously reflecting the hopes and aspirations of the two authors I thought the book was a fine celebration of Americanism.
Firstly though the book is a visual treat. Designer George Lois has handled a whole range of graphic material brilliantly, especially in presenting similar items on the same spread: a photo of James Brown (The godfather of soul) facing Marlon Brando (The godfather of film) or baseball player Babe Ruth facing a Baby Ruth chocolate bar or a spread with a photo of an apple pie (As American as apple pie) and an Apple logo (Apple changes the American lifestyle). Another lovely design touch is running five Burma-Shave signs over five pages (The bearded lady/Tried a jar/She's now a famous/Movie star!/Burma-Shave).
Lois has blended all the personality photos, product shots, logos, paintings, cartoons and display typography together beautifully and the 175dpi printing on quality paper makes everything sparkle. The design treatment did remind of a similar strong visual book covering the same subject '1001 Reasons to Love America' (ISBN 1584793775).
I liked the wide-ranging coverage of icons throughout the pages and nicely not necessarily positive ones. Page seventy-one features the Enron logo, page 135 has a cutout photo of a lemon with Edsel printed on it, also included are a few frames from the Zapruder home movie of Kennedy's death likewise a photo of OJ Simpson, in court, trying on a glove.
The book is essentially visual and all of the images get detailed captions, sometimes a hundred words or more. The authors, where needed, provide light hearted headlines as in the housewives' favorite 'Yes, Virginia, there really is no Betty Crocker'. Cesar Chavez gets 'The grapes of wrath' or 'The web of justice' for Spider-Man.
You'll probably have your own icon that is not included, though with four hundred it'll be hard to pin-point something that's missing. All I could come up with is UPS and FedEx, neither are included in the comprehensive index. Maybe the reality is that the strength of America's past and present could easily produce a second volume!
***FOR AN INSIDE LOOK click 'customer images' under the cover.
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