Avedon, Richard. Nothing Personal by Richard Avedon and James Baldwin.

Atheneum, 1964. First edition. Copyright by C.J. Bucher, Lucerne, Switzerland.  Published in Canada by McClelland & Stewart, Ltd. Designed by Marvin Israel. Good condition with wear at spine tips.  Lacks slipcase.  Small brown spot on one page. Custom-made 4 mil polyester jacket.  Not issued with dust jacket. Included in Parr & Badger, Vol. 1, which states this is the best of Avedon's books.  See photos.  Summary:

Nothing Personal (published in 1964 by Atheneum) is a landmark collaborative book by legendary photographer Richard Avedon and iconic writer and essayist James Baldwin. Former high school classmates at DeWitt Clinton High School in the Bronx, the duo reunited to create a fierce, complex, and deeply humanistic critique of American society at the height of the Civil Rights Movement.

Key Focus Areas

• The Creative Synergy: The book pairs Avedon’s stark, minimal, and often unsettling black-and-white studio portraits with Baldwin’s piercing, four-part essay. Together, they examine the spiritual isolation, moral contradictions, and systemic racism plaguing a deeply divided United States.

• The Critique of American Myths: Baldwin’s text strips away the polished veneer of the "American Dream." He writes incisively about the commercialization of life, the emptiness of media saturation, and the profound loneliness of an affluent society that refuses to look honestly at its own history and inequality.

• The Visual Contrast: Avedon’s portraits juxtapose the powerful and the marginalized to expose the nation's fractured soul. The book places images of segregationists (like George Wallace) and aging politicians alongside civil rights icons, mental asylum patients, cultural figures, and ordinary citizens, stripping away artificial backgrounds to focus entirely on human expression.

• A Message of Hope and Resistance: Despite its blistering critique of existential despair and societal failure, the collaboration concludes on a note of endurance. Both Avedon’s final photographs of SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee) activists and Baldwin's closing prose advocate for the redemptive, radical power of human love, solidarity, and truth-telling.

• Richard Avedon (1923–2004) was a famous American fashion and portrait photographer who helped define post-war visual culture. After serving as a Photographer’s Mate in the U.S. Merchant Marine during World War II, Avedon studied under legendary art director Alexey Brodovitch and quickly rose to prominence as the chief photographer for Harper's Bazaar and later Vogue. He revolutionized fashion photography by replacing static, posed models with dynamic, motion-filled imagery set in real-world environments. Beyond the fashion world, Avedon became world-renowned for his stark, large-format black-and-white portraiture—capturing cultural icons, politicians, and everyday working-class Americans against minimalist white backdrops that emphasized raw, psychological vulnerability. In 1992, he became the first staff photographer in the history of The New Yorker, leaving behind a vast artistic legacy that bridged the gap between commercial editorial work and fine art photography.