Robert Heinecken: Magazines

Robert Heinecken (1931–2006) seldom used a camera. A self-described “para-photographer,” he repurposed found imagery to explore the underpinnings of daily life. He cut into periodicals―snipping heads from lithe bodies and slicing rouged lips from smiling cheeks―and reorganized these fragments into collaged wholes that reveal the greed, hypocrisy and misogyny behind traditional depictions of America.

This book presents Heinecken’s Periodicals (1969–72) and Revised Magazines (1989–94) as 25 facsimiles. Originally conceived as insertions into everyday life, these collage-publications were taken from newsstands, altered and then returned to be purchased by unsuspecting consumers. By pasting a Vietnam War image into fashion magazines or a dominatrix into Time, Heinecken created serials that are disturbing yet familiar; known cultural referents now oppose their presumed functions.