Song Sparrow, 2007 © Paula McCartney

A bird watcher’s dream comes to life via Paula McCartney’s Bird Watching series in her first solo show in New York. The opening reception for Paula McCartney’s Bird Watching will be Wednesday, March 3, from 6–8pm, the exhibit runs from March 4 to April 23, 2010 at Klompching Gallery, New York. An in-conversaton between Paula McCartney and Darius Himes of Radius Books, followed by a book signing will be held in the gallery on Saturday, March 6th from 1–2pm. Bird Watching is also a newly released book published by Princeton Architectural Press.

Mig-21, Mongolia. © Eric Lusito

Traveling through Russia and the former satelite states of the Soviet Union—from East Germany to Mongolia, from Poland to the far reaches of Kazakhstan—Eric Lusito sought to photograph the abandoned Soviet miltary bases that were left behind as the remnants of a fallen Empire. From its creation in 1961, the Berlin Wall became emblematic of the divide between the West and the Eastern Bloc during the Cold War—when it came down in 1989, it signalled the collapse of Soviet hegemony over the Eastern Bloc. After the Wall, just published by Dewi Lewis, is Eric Lusito’s photographic record of the land and architecture—haunted by the symbols and history of a once powerful Empire.

All Photographs © Josef Koudelka. Behind the CKD Praha factory, looking towards the Hloubetin district.

In a recent survey leading up to the release of the 30th anniversary issue of PDN, readers voted Josef Koudelka’s Invasion 68: Prague (Aperture, 2008) one of the most influential books of the decade. The book (which has been published in in ten countries, most recently in Russia) gathers more than 250 of the photographs Koudelka took in August 1968 during the Prague Spring, when Warsaw Pact tanks invaded Prague and Soviet soldiers clashed with citizens and protesters. (more…)

“Accademia Bridge, Venice, Italy 2007,” © Michael Kenna, Courtesy of Robert Mann Gallery, New York City

A toned silver print of this image is included in Michael Kenna’s new exhibit, “Venezia,” on view at the Robert Mann Gallery in New York City through March 13. The book Michael Kenna: Venezia will be published this spring by Nazraeli Press.