 |
Editor: Jason Bitner
Recover the best of FOUND Polaroids in our latest book, a collection of FOUND's favorite unpublished snapshots. Once tossed and forgotten on city streets, subway cars, and front yards around the world, now compiled into an amazing and eclectic photo collection. Alternately funny, touching, and surprising, each page guarantees the instantaneous pleasure unique to Polaroids. Come take a peek! Where do lost Polaroids go?
Lovingly designed by Paul Koob!
-Peek inside FOUND Polaroids-
San Francisco Chronicle
"FOUND... is a voyeur's dream. Exploring its pages, one gets a giddy high from its privileged, unauthorized glimpse into the private lives of strangers. Some of the stuff is hilarious, some of it achingly sad or pathetic, but nothing is less than human"
Venus Zine
"Polaroid film is expensive but that doesn't stop people from forgetting their pictures all over the place. Lucky for all of us, FOUND has been collecting the ones left behind for years, keeping a formidable stash of the blurry, the mysterious, the touching and the unexplainable..."
The Guardian
"It is a brilliantly simple idea: contributors pick litter up and then print their most intriguing finds with no editorial comment beyond the occasional quizzical caption. The result is a kind of eavesdropping, slightly voyeuristic yet utterly compelling."
Satisfied Customers!
"Today, at long last, I received my copy of the Found Polaroids book. As soon as I opened it I was completely captivated and unable to put it down until I had looked at and read about each and every photo. Thank you so much for putting together this wonderful book. It was completely worth the wait. I am utterly delighted. It's a beautiful and thoughtful thing and you should all be very proud. Thanks and take care."
-Maika
"I got the Polaroid book - thanks so much! I love it. I received it at work and my co-workers kept getting caught up, looking at it."
- Lorca
"I love the FOUND Polaroids book! I finished it last night. My favorites are:
* the fat guy and the dog in the triangle dog house
* the kid with the chili lights up his nose (arms out strangely, too)
* super freshly-dressed kid at putt-putt golf
* old person in massage chair
* foxy lady in red pantsuit w/ lovely sky"
- Laurie
"DUDE, my girlfriend just busted in with some FOUND Books and told me you finally published the Polaroids Book. I AM STOKED!!! You Rule! Thank you. I have been such a fan since back in the day in New York, buying your mag in that weird independent bookstore on Bleeker and watching Davy make a fool of himself in bookstores from 14th St. to Los Feliz, Cali! Being a part of FOUND completes my ancient memory of first discovering your indie mag in the streets of NY. What you guys do ranks high. Keep up the good work. There are very few projects or artists who I can say I am a fan of; I'm telling you FOUND is on that list!! You RULE and deserve everything, every ounce of success you gain!"
- Jesse
"I've been meaning to write to you, as the library copy of the found polaroid book brought much needed sunshine to our doors. Excellent work yet again!"
- Nancy
By Davy Rothbart
FOUND II, the follow-up to the acclaimed national bestseller, contains an engrossing, eye-opening assortment of the latest and greatest lost, tossed, and forgotten items -- love notes, shopping lists, doodles, and diary entries -- from around the world. Whether they are found on city sidewalks, stuck in chain-link fences, tucked into the pockets of secondhand clothing, or on the grass in a school yard, these items give readers an uncensored, poignant, and often hilarious peek into other people's lives.
David Letterman
"A great book..."
Los Angeles Times
"A fascinating and wonderfully moving collage of human emotion."
Chicago Tribune
"What's more irresistible than reading a letter not meant for your eyes? … A quirky lens into the flotsam and jetsam of humanity."
Boston Globe
"FOUND is a powerful fix for thinking voyeurs."
By Davy Rothbart
For the last couple years you guys have been sending us your amazing, hilarious, and heartbreaking finds, and so - thanks to all of you - the biggest FOUND project yet is born into the world. The FOUND book has 211 pages of all-new never-seen-before finds, plus 40 pages of our old-school favorites.
We are so proud and excited about this book, and we can't wait for you to see it. The FOUND book is available at every single bookstore in the U.S. - we hope you'll race over and check it out! And thanks again to every one of you who has helped create this book by being a part of FOUND these past couple of years - we have mad love for you!
The Washington Post
A treasury of trash, a wonderfully weird collection...a fascinating glimpse into the wackier depths of America's collective
subconscious.
David Sedaris
A fascinating collection. It will break your heart.
Powells.com
Somewhat more banal than so called "reality" programs, and all the more poignant for it, FOUND is an eclectic, sometimes
bizarre, and frequently fascinating compilation. An addictive read for the voyeur in you.
David Eggers
The extreme pleasure this book brings is really hard to explain, and the more we try to analyze it, the more troubling our
enjoyment might become.
LaPorte, Indiana
By Jason Bitner
The Ultimate Find! FOUND Magazine editor Jason Bitner has made it a habit of picking up after us, walking down the back alleys of our lives, and accumulating all that we've thrown away or mislaid. One afternoon not long ago, after lunch at a small Midwestern diner, he stumbled onto a forgotten archive. In the back of the restaurant were box upon box of studio portraits of the townspeople of LaPorte, Indiana—over 18,000 in total.
Taken over four decades, the photos marked important milestones—a sailor in uniform, a graduate in cap and gown, a couple newly engaged—while others simply made modest attempts at posterity. Each in their unique way reveals both a public and private face, a story untold, a secret to reveal. They are admittedly brief moments and ones in which people have purposefully posed for the camera. Smiling. Caring. Loving. Pensive. Serious. These are pictures of all of us in a way, reflections in a mirror of the everyday moments and events that define all of our lives. LaPorte, Indiana is a major cultural excavation and an opening into these lives, into this town, and into the heart of our nation.
John Mellencamp
"These are real people. The grace and dignity one sees in their faces should
be a source of hope for us all"
The Wall Street Journal
“If there was an American look 40 or 50 years ago – at least one recognizable throughout Middle America – these faces may be it.”
BoingBoing.com
“I can't recommend LaPorte, Indiana highly enough for fans of photography, ephemera, or curiosities. Looking at these anonymous people is deeply moving.”
print magazine
“The photos recreate a yearbook from the Midwest that previously existed only in our nostalgic imaginations.”
The Lone Surfer of Montana, Kansas
By Davy Rothbart
"I’ve always drifted around the country a lot, and perhaps what I love most about this kind of travel are the brief, fleeting moments of crossing paths with strangers—-a truck-stop waitress, kids at a basketball court, a guy who’s broken down on the side of the road and needs a jump. These little exchanges, I think of them as FOUND moments; just like the FOUND notes, you get a little glimpse into someone else’s life, enough to make you wonder about the rest of their story. I’m real big into writing stories, and a lot of the time it’s a FOUND note or one of these tiny moments-—a stranger I’ve blundered across for an instant—-that sparks an idea for what I want to write about.
"A few years ago, I was driving on a small two-lane highway through rural Kansas when I saw a bizarre and riveting sight—-a teenage kid had slung a surfboard between two dead tractors in the middle of a cornfield and was balanced on top, like he was practicing how to surf. Here he was, thousands of miles from either coast, the sun setting in glorious colors behind him—-I was mesmerized and sat there watching for ten minutes or so, and then I drove away; I don’t think he even saw me. But that image of him surfing in the cornfields stuck with me, and my curiosity about him kept growing more intense, so finally I decided to write a story about him, imagining what his life was like and what might have happened had our paths intersected. I called the story The Lone Surfer of Montana, Kansas (Montana is the name of a tiny town in Kansas) and it’s the title story of my new book. I hope you'll check it out."
--Davy
Arthur Miller
"Davy writes with his whole heart. These stories are crushing."
Ira Glass
"I believe in Davy. He's a force to be reckoned with."
The Los Angeles Times
"Funny, flashy... a great whirlwind..."
Entertainment Weekly
"A quirky, perceptive volume..."
Judy Blume
"It's always exciting to discover a talented new writer. Davy writes with such energy, wit, and heart."
 |
|
 |
         |
We collect FOUND stuff: love letters, birthday cards, kids' homework,
to-do lists, ticket stubs, poetry on napkins, telephone bills, doodles -
anything that gives a glimpse into someone
else's life. Anything goes...
