What better way to kick off your summer than a collection of the oiled skin, sprayed hair, pageantry, tanned bodies, and curves from Joseph Szabo’s Jones Beach opening at M+B tonight, June 10th from 6 to 8pm. In addition to all the vintage beach bodies you can handle on the wall, Abrams Books has released the collection in book form, so you can admire the dazzling display of dynamic beach-goers. There will be a book signing at the gallery on Saturday, June 12 from 2 to 4pm. The exhibition will run from June 10, 2010 to August 14, 2010.

Here’s some more info on the series, and check out the images below.
Somewhat of an expert on the subject of teenagers with his previous works Almost Grown and Teenage, Szabo began shooting at Jones Beach one summer when his usual subjects – his photography students from Malverne High School – were no longer readily available. He chronicled the public and the private lives displayed on this ocean playground that is one of the world’s busiest beaches. Even if we weren’t there to enjoy the good weather and excellent people watching we have these photographs, which turn a captive eye to the urban masses who came out to celebrate their weekends, holidays and summers. Jones Beach reveals the forces in motion at such a theater of humanness, from moments of quiet introspection to flashy exuberance. Called the “people’s palace by the sea”, Jones Beach is still a unique space very different from the commercial appeal of Coney Island or the privileged seclusion of the Hamptons. On this democratic stretch of sand and ocean class, race, and other potential divisions were temporarily forgotten and Szabo’s sympathetic lens was there to capture it all.

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