JIM GOLDBERG: An American Outsider

In today's media landscape, a book review is often a slap on the back. A handshake among colleagues that says, “well done.” But we have never been afraid to offer critique when critique is due. In our print section Berlin Reviews, we've always tried to take the propositions of a book seriously and push them to their extremes.

Cracked-out, brown, with gold teeth. Arm-length scars scored across bony bodies. Teenage pregnancies. Punched-in bruises. A view of humanity carved out from destitution in analogue photographs and scrawled text— “You need me to feel superior, I need you to laugh at.” Jim Goldberg rose to acclaim for the bookRaised by Wolves(1995), a photo journal following runaways in America. Largely focusing on two figures, Echo and Tweeky Dave, it uses a combination of hand-manipulated effects, including collage, letters, and written annotations. Raised by Wolves sits beside Candy(2017) and Rich and Poor (1985) in a trilogy that comments on America’s dichotomous social landscape, exploring race, class, age, love, lust, and betrayal. Goldberg has defined his fascination with such subjects as a projection of his own “outsider” status, and he uses his camera as a portal to people detached from the masses.

Goldberg’s new book, Coming and Going (2023), turns the light on him-self and his family by applying the same techniques. He chronicles his life from the 1980s to the present day, exploring themes of parenthood, aging, love, and death. The result is as intricate as it is bold — some parts oozing satire, others daringly vulnerable. There’s a sunbathing mother basking in self-absorption and vitamin D. A cancer-stricken father, spoon-fed and shaved on his 76th birthday, depicted alongside Goldberg’s daughter as she takes her first steps. A honeymoon on a single bed, divorce, new love. Gold-berg’s voice is ever present. He is likable. Sarcastic. He revels in moments that dispel irony: “THE WATER AT THEEND OF THE FARM WE STAYED ATDIDN’T WORK, AND BY THE END OF SUMMER NEITHER DID OUR RELATIONSHIP,” he writes on a picture of a car crash.

By the end of Coming and Going, Goldberg has a grown-up daughter. He is parentless. His wife is an ex. He has a new partner. A palpable peace-fulness shows up in the depictions of his life, as his past becomes a sum of parts all quite neatly tied. Goldberg’s work concerns the “dialectical argument of life,” explores society’s discursive spatials, nestles between fact and fiction. Here, in the eyes of the be-holder and the beheld, Goldberg settles the discussion, finding that life it-self is lived and felt most in these moments of high contradiction. The title Coming and Going proves definitive: Goldberg continues. The back matter reads, “Still Going.”

“Coming and Going” is published by MACK (London, 2023). www.mackbooks.co.uk