RECOMMENDED BOOK
ISBN 0-81184-161-8 (paperback)
128 pages
published November 2003 by Chronicle Books
ISBN 0-9440-9246-2 (hardcover)
104 pages
published December 1997 by Twin Palms Publishers of Santa Fe, New Mexico
Originally published in 1968 by MacMillan, this is a high-quality photo-documentary (with accompanying text) of the motorcycling culture of the mid-1960s. The first part of the book contains 48 black-and-white photographs of bikeriders, which were taken using a Nikon F camera and capture the brazen spirit of the people and the time. Many of the photographs were taken in the Midwestern United States. Danny Lyon, the photographer, was a member of the Chicago Outlaw Motorcycle Club during 1965 and 1966 and owned a 1956 Triumph motorcycle
(a British brand popularized in the United States by the New York dealer Reggie Pink in the 1930s). The second part of the book contains edited transcripts of 17 reel-to-reel tape-recorded stories that vividly depict the weekend activities of these motorcyclists.
Table of Contents:
Photographs:
Text:
Photographs from The Bikeriders have been on display at various galleries around the United States for many years. For instance, the Art Institute of Chicago displayed these photos in 1966, the Milwaukee Art Museum displayed them in the late 1980s (and again in 2003), the Michael H. Lord Gallery in Milwaukee displayed them in 1998, and the Edwynn Houk Gallery in New York displayed them in 1997 and 1998.
Reviews:
"Lyon's photographs stand out in how he takes this subject matter which has been traditionally displayed photographically as idealized figures fighting for dignity in the face of subjugation... and presents it without an attempt to provoke an immediate response of compassion. In Lyon's photographs the fringe is the fringe, it gets along fine without you and will continue to do so.
No one has ever made better photographs of the motorcycling culture; and the text transcribed from the audio tapes made of the photo's subjects is fascinating for the peek it gives us into the language used around the midwest in the 1960s and how much it has changed since. Recommended!"
- Troy Johnson, in Minnesota Motorcycle Monthly, August 1999
"Bikers have left the conventional world behind for one of their own making....
That's the spin, anyway. But where did it arise? One clue is to be found in the ''Bikeriders'' photographs of Danny Lyon.... Lyon's work feeds off and into the developing image of the biker, caught, in this moment, between Eisenhower-era greaser and Johnsonian hippie; somewhere between enthusiasts and criminals, but not settled, completely, into either role. Lyons captures a moment in the formation of a mythology."
- Nathan Guequierre, in Shepherd Express, June 18, 1998
"The best of the pictures were taken on the road, with Lyon astride his full-bore Triumph, and were said to be the visual inspiration for Easy Rider."
- Andy Grundberg, in British Vogue, November 1992
The hardcover reprint of "The Bikeriders" by Twin Palms Publishers is now out of print. However, you can purchase the paperback reprint from Chronicle Books. This Chronicle Books edition is special because it includes black-and-white photographs and color prints that had not been included in the previous two editions.
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