an exceptional copy with the rare original bandRuscha's first attempt to photograph the strip on foot failed as parked cars got in the way. He resolved this problem by driving up and down Sunset Boulevard with a motor-driven 35mm camera fixed to his truck, photographing every building between Hollywood and Beverly Hills. The resulting photographs were laid out and joined together. The even-numbered south side runs along the top, the north side along the bottom, with the corresponding numbers printed below each building and names of cross streets. This accurate record of a period of extraordinary growth in Los Angeles is representative of the urban sprawl taking place throughout the United States. Sol Lewitt (writing in Artforum, Summer 1969) highlighted Every Building on Sunset Strip as a key work in his definition of Conceptual Art, a movement driven by ideas before form.First edition, first issue, with a small extra flap at the end due to a miscalculation by the printer; (176 x 137 mm, 7 x 5½ in), accordion-fold sequence of offset-printed black & white photographs, attached to inside of upper wrapper; white wrappers, spine and upper side printed in silver, publisher's silver mylar-covered board slipcase, with the lightly toned rare original white wraparound band, fine; [52]pp.Regards à travers Le Livre 138; Engberg & Phillpot, Edward Ruscha: Editions 1959-1999. Catalogue Raisonne (B4); The Book of 101 Books: Seminal Photographic Books of the Twentieth Century pp182-5; The Open Book: A History of the Photographic Book from 1878 to the Present pp198-9; The Photobook: A History II, pp142-3.
