SAM HASKINS - FIVE GIRLS

Artist: Sam Haskins
Publisher: Crown Publishers
Year: 1962
Edition: First US Edition — True First Printing
Language: English
Format: Large Format Hardcover with Dust Jacket
Dimensions: Approx. 22 × 28 cm
Condition: Near Fine. Light general wear to dust jacket (Very Good condition), now protected in a removable archival sleeve. Slight toning to page edges; interior otherwise clean and binding firm.

Five Girls is a landmark early photobook by Sam Haskins, standing as a defining work in the development of fashion, figure, and narrative photography during the 1960s.

Conceived while Haskins was living and working in Johannesburg, the project developed outside his commercial practice as a personal exploration of the photographic possibilities of the female figure. Centered around five models, the book presents an extended sequence of images moving between clothed and unclothed studies, with an emphasis on movement, personality, gesture, and visual rhythm.

Rather than treating the figure as a static subject, Haskins constructs a dynamic photographic language in which bodies, poses, expressions, and environments interact across the sequence. The images move fluidly between observation and direction, creating an atmosphere that feels spontaneous while remaining carefully composed.

Haskins combines graphic composition, bold lighting, strong contrasts, and cinematic pacing, establishing a visual vocabulary that would become central to his subsequent photobooks. The sequencing allows individual photographs to operate as part of a larger rhythm, with repetition and variation gradually developing the personalities and relationships of the five subjects.

The photographs possess a distinctive sense of ease and collaboration. Haskins's approach avoids the distance of conventional figure studies, instead allowing moments of play, movement, and interaction to emerge naturally. The resulting images occupy an ambiguous space between fashion photography, portraiture, performance, and intimacy.

A defining characteristic of the publication is its use of photogravure printing, which produces exceptional tonal richness, deep blacks, and subtle gradations across the photographic image. The process gives the photographs a tactile and atmospheric quality, allowing fine details and variations in light to remain visible throughout the sequence.

Published by Crown Publishers in 1962, this First US Edition and True First Printing represents an important early appearance of Haskins's groundbreaking photographic language in the American publishing market. The large-format presentation gives the photographs considerable visual presence while reinforcing the book's status as a photographic object in its own right.

The combination of sophisticated printing, carefully controlled sequencing, and Haskins's innovative approach to the figure helped establish Five Girls as an influential contribution to the history of the photobook. Its integration of fashion, movement, intimacy, and graphic experimentation anticipated developments that would shape photographic publishing throughout the following decades.

A foundational title in twentieth-century photobook history, Five Girls remains a highly significant and collectible example of Sam Haskins's early photographic practice and of the transformation of figure photography during the 1960s.