Voices & Visions of the American West

Philippe's aerial and ground photos of the Loire River Valley, the residential center of French nobility until the reign of Louis XIVportray 19 chateaux, ranging in design from medieval fortresses to Renaissance palaces. His lens captures a tree-hidden chateau tower and spies through the clouds upon buildings and landscapes. He chooses dark backdrops for the austere chateaux, like Voltaire's home, Sully-sur Loire, and brighter skies for the peaceful Renaissance structures. The pictures are multiseasonalelaborate, sprawling gardens in winter white as well as summer green, vast grounds covered with autumn leaves, the Loire frozen in the winter. Gouvion's fine notes at the end describing the salient architectural features and the historical importance of each chateau would have been more useful within the body of the book. Philippe and Gouvion previouslycollaborated on Paris from the Air.(December)