It's Complicated: The American Teenager

A series of collaborative portraits wherein Robin Bowman shares her discoveries of a generation now coming of age in the US. In searing and intimate portraits, presented alongside the young people's... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1884167691
• ISBN13: 9781884167690
• Release Date: October 2007
• Publisher: Umbrage Editions Inc
• Length: 156 Pages
• Weight: 2.48 lbs.
• Dimensions: 11.3" x 0.8" x 9.5"
• Age Range: 12 years and up
• Grade Range: Grade 7 and higher

Customer Reviews

Teenagers and their parents will find it compelling

My 15 year old received this book as a Christmas present. It has remained out and open since then. All of her friends have picked it up and found entries that they found interesting and compelling. The book truly represents the cross-section of the teen experience in America. The author's compassion and concern for the teens as individuals is evident throughout the profiles, allowing it to speak to the universal truth about making it through those teen years. "It's Complicated" indeed.

Captivating

Honesty....you know it when you see it. Robin Bowman's photography is as authentic as it gets.Captivating black and white potraits of teenagers telling their own story through Robin's lens. The respect she pays her subjects and their journey is so plain to see, it's hard to avert your eyes from the potraits. You get the feeling there is some of us in each of them.

Book captures the essense of teenagers in America

Robin has so skillfully found the the soul of the American teenager. There is not one soul, but for her, 419 souls. Each is rich and diverse and she captures each of them not only with her insightful photos that find the soul of each of her subjects, but also in the heart felt and honest answers she is able to get in her interviews. Thank you Robin for capturing our children so well. We are truly a diverse nation and that is our richness.

Incredibly Compelling and Poignant

'It's Complicated' is a fabulous book that provides magnificent insight into teenagers in this day and age. It is not only unique in that it combines candid interviews with candid yet beautifully composed photographs, but also because it takes you through walks of life you have never experienced (or never knew existed). The book presents everyone from a young woman who spends her mornings catching lobster with her father for a living to a group of girls from New Orleans who discuss the role of class and money in their school. I highly recommend this book for anyone who wishes to take a journey with Robin Bowman through the heart of America. Robin Bowman is a modern day Jack Kerouac, using candid moments to craft a history of an era sprinkled with differences in views all over America. You will step away from the book with not only a newfound appreciation for the art of photography and the impact it can make but also with a newfound appreciation for your own adolescence, and for people like Robin Bowman who go out and interview people you have only dreamed of meeting.

An impressive and unique photographic journal

"It's Complicated: the American Teenager" is a compilation of photographs taken in a five year exploration by Robin Bowman of the largest generation of teenagers in American history. Consisting of a series of 415 'collaborative portraits', a diverse range of teenagers are showcased by in pictures and in their own words. The photographed teens represent every region of American and every socioeconomic group from Texas debutantes to New York City gangbangers. Offering visually reinforced insights into the diversity of individual personalities and attitudes, "It's Complicated" is an impressive and unique photographic journal, making it a very highly recommended addition to personal, academic, and community library American Photography reference collections.