Hardback.
100 pages.
Bueno! Books 2006. ISBN978-4-9900391-7-2
P.O.P. is a huge book (14" x 9"!) showcasing photographs taken by Akira Kobayashi in Venice Beach and the surrounding L.A. neighbourhoods between 1969-1972.
Named after Pacific Ocean Park, the derelict amusement park which consumed 28 acres of the L.A. coastline, Kobayashi's photos present a rare opportunity to be a fly on the wall as the hippy dream fizzles out, the shortboard revolution takes hold, Hell's Angels run riot and the utopian dream of Abbot Kinney crumbles into the urban wasteland of Dogtown.
Bueno! Books are a 1% for the Planet member, and have pledged to give one percent of all their sales to grassroots environmental organisations.
ABOUT AKIRA KOBAYASHI
Born in Tokyo in 1940, Akira Kobayashi studied photography as an apprentice to several eminent photographers before his career found its defining path in 1965. After coming across Lawrence Lipton's book "The Holy Barbarians" and its intimate portrayal of the Beat Generation, Akira became fascinated by one particular subject; the Californian town of Venice West. In 1969 he took the plunge and moved to California, where he spent much of his time living the hippy dream in a van. His passion for new trends, fashion and living in new places led him to London in the 1980s. After studying and photographing surfers since his days on the West Coast in 1969, Kobayashi finally got in the water himself in the year 2000 and aged 60 became a keen surfer. Since he has become a bit of a stalwart in the world of Japanese surf magazines.
