Abstractions Arrive

This iPad-only volume pairs a penetrating 15,000-word essay on modern art and photography by William H. Gass — a writer Bookworm's Michael Silverblatt has called "our greatest living writer of prose in America” — with the "Abstractions" series of photographs by internationally collected photographer Michael Eastman. Gass and Eastman are friends, neighbors, and collaborators, having partnered on, among other projects, "Auguste Rodin" (Archipelago Books, 2004). The writing in "Abstractions Arrive" is quintessential Gass — erudite, playful, probing, fun. Eastman's images, which iPad users can tap to isolate and make larger, are some of the most striking in his decades-long oeuvre.