Image maker in the fine arts: with a deliberate aesthetic and a cutting-edge commitment, Delano Greenidge has established a reputation for publishing high-quality visual books

Black Issues Book Review, March-April, 2005 by Rhonda Stewart

The volumes in the fine-arts series published by Delano Greenidge Editions (DGE) defy, easy categorization. There are the granular nudes in Black Bodies (2002); or the concentrated photographs in Kodachrome: The American Invention of Our World, 1939-1959 (2002); or the rich aesthetics of Avant-Garde Page Design 1900-1950 (2001) and much more. Delano Greenidge captures plenty of attention for his books through diverse visual approaches.

DGE is one of the country's few black-owned publishers of such high-quality books. The 20-year-old company operates from a modest office inside a Harlem brownstone, although the production and design work is done by contract with vendors located all over the world.

Greenidge says his company is now in its second phase. He started by commissioning artists to create works for wealthy collectors. But after five years, he decided to switch course and create art books instead. "I basically got bored with making projects that only rich people could afford," he says. "One of the reasons I left that business was because most of the people who bought these things, which cost thousands of dollars, didn't look at what they bought, they just bought it because they could afford it.

"Making art books was an entree into book publishing, but we've also done mass-market books and collaborations with other publishers," Greenidge says. "However, publishing is difficult. It is one of the purest capitalist games around. Yet many of us don't have access to the kind of capital we'd like to have access to; capital that would allow them to build their own slice of a media empire."

Greenidge was born in Port of Spain, Trinidad. A determined creative soul, he honed his artistic senses through both school and traveling. He studied photographic technology at the Rochester Institute of Technology; received a degree in art history from the University of New Mexico; and he learned printing at the Sorbonne in Paris and in Berlin. In the late 1980s, while he was spending a good deal of time in Cologne, Germany, he read a newspaper article about high-caliber printing technology available in East Germany, which gave him an idea. He decided to tap the knowledge of painting and photography be had acquired through his studies (as well as film, architecture, and art history) and print four-color books.

Greenidge's first book, Blinky Palermo (1989), was about the German artist and cult figure Blinky Palermo. Palermo, whose real name was Peter Schwarze, created a sensation in the art world before his death at age 34 in 1977. Greenidge's book on the German painter was well received and other books later followed, including Kodachrome, a book of iconic color photos from the 1940s and '50s. The book included many images that had never been seen before. Another important title in Greenidge's catalog is Gardner's Photographic Sketchbook of the American Civil War 1861-1865. The DGE release, published in 2001, is a reprint of work that was originally published in two volumes in 1866. It collects images by Alexander Gardner, who was the official photographer of the Union Army in the Potomac. He also worked with photographic pioneer Matthew Brady before striking out on his own.

"Publishing is quite complex. Each book that went out during my early years in business was a learning experience. There are two distinct areas of publishing: production, producing the book, and distribution," Greenidge says. "It's very easy for someone to produce a book if they have money for it. The key in all media businesses is distribution and that is a learning curve."

Greenidge says that while marketing campaigns aren't typically assigned to each book, each title becomes a way to market the company and help it grow. The audience for his titles varies, as evidenced by the fact that they're sold not just in museum bookstores but also in an array of outlets from large chains such as Barnes & Noble to university bookstores. A major seller for his firm, Greenidge says, would be 10,000 to 20,000 copies. He added that DGE books are distributed in 30 to 40 countries around the world.

In 2005, Greenidge plans to produce 16 titles. Right now, though, he's working on The Death of Photography and Other Modern Fables on the Visual Arts, a 400-page book about the relationship of photography in society and all cultures; it will include essays from up-and-coming writers, as well as influential critics such as Susan Sontag and lean Baudrillard.

Although his company is affected by the ups and downs of the economy--just as other publishers are--Greenidge says that DGE's growing recognition means it no longer exists as an underground operation. "Our books are not so much art books as they are books about culture," he adds.

One might think that his projects are a bit cutting edge, especially coming from a black publisher. "I think that not only in today's [American] society but in all societies, down through the ages, you have to be somewhat cutting edge or advanced to be in a decision-making position. And there are not many people of color who are involved in the decisions of design and image," Greenidge says. "And it's important to have control of your image--whether it's your own, or in the kind of movies you make, or in the types books you produce."