In 1978 Luigi Ghirri self-published his first book, an avant-garde manifesto for the photographic medium and a milestone in his own remarkable work. Long out of print, Kodachrome was republished by MACK in a second edition marking the twentieth anniversary of Ghirri's death. "Ghirri fights to preserve our ability to see. His works are powerful devices for re-educating the gaze. They alter our perception of the world without proposing a single path to follow, instead providing the tools we need to find the one we seek." Part amateur photo album, Ghirri presents his surroundings in tightly framed images, photographing photographs and recording the Italian landscape through its advertisements, postcards, potted plants, walls, windows and people. His work is deadpan, reflecting a dry wit, and continually engages with reality and landscape as a snapshot of our interaction with the world. This new edition of Kodachrome is published as a facsimile of the original, retaining its design, text layout and image sequence, but using new image files scanned from Ghirri's original film to take advantage of modern technology and printing methods. A small booklet includes an essay by Francesco Zanot offering a contemporary perspective on Kodachrome's historical impact, alongside French and German translations of the book's original texts, published in English and Italian. "The everyday encounter with reality, fictions, fictions, substitutes, ambiguous, poetic or alienating aspects, seems to prevent any escape from the labyrinth, whose walls become ever more illusory... to the point where we may merge with them... The meaning I try to convey through my work is an examination of how it is still possible to desire and pursue a path of knowledge, so as finally to distinguish the precise identity of humanity, things and life from the image of humanity, things and life." Luigi Ghirri. Born in Scandiano in 1943, Luigi Ghirri spent his working life in Emilia Romagna, where he created one of the most open-ended and layered bodies of work in the history of photography. Widely published and exhibited in Italy and abroad, he was at the height of his career when he died in 1992. Photography critic and curator Francesco Zanot had, at the time of this account, spent more than 10 years working with some of the best-known European and international photographers, including Alec Soth and Olivo Barbieri. He has participated in numerous photography conferences and seminars at institutions including Columbia University in New York and the American Academy in Rome. The accompanying biography identifies him as associate editor of Fantom, a quarterly photography magazine based in Milan and New York. Kodachrome Luigi Ghirri
 
Some stains on the cover (see photographs).