Kickstarter

Joe’s Junk Yard is a personal narrative photo book, spanning more than fifty years and three generations, that explores one family's achievement and subsequent demise of the American Dream. Kereszi’s grandfather, a first-generation American and boxer-turned-junkman, built an empire of used cars and scrap metal during the 1950’s boom times, only to be slowly, but consistently, foiled by a series of events, some outside of his control. Kereszi's disquieting, loving photographs of the last decade of the business, along with historic ephemera and scrapbook photographs, tell the story of this family and its struggles with a changing economy, urban decline, family feuds, tragic and untimely deaths, and the challenges of an independent, family-run business. The family and the junk yard also represent larger themes that exist in our culture and economy today. In this photographic series, begun before she pursued formal studies in photography and continued during her years at Bard College and at Yale University, Kereszi shows that loss is frequently found in the landscape of the junkyard, even though there is also every possible part for any useful function. Lisa Kereszi is the author of three previous books: Governors Island, with Andrew Moore (GIPEC and Public Art Fund), Fantasies (Damiani, 2007), and Fun and Games (Nazraeli Press, 2009). Joe's Junk Yard is set to go on press in May 2012 at Damiani Editore in Italy. Funds are needed to complete the scanning and proof prints for over 100 images, travel costs associated with going on press to oversee the printing, and travel and shipping costs associated with promoting the project for possible exhibition come Fall, when it is released.