Julius Knipl, Real Estate Photographer: The Beauty Supply District #[nn]

Ben Katchor's Julius Knipl, Real Estate Photographer: The Beauty Supply District captures the quiet, melancholy poetry of urban commercial life — a lone figure with a briefcase navigates a streetscape packed with wonderfully absurd storefronts advertising "Symmetry Shop," "Transcendental Idealism," and "Mind Work (Wholesale Only)." The cover's loose, ink-washed style perfectly evokes the faded, dreaming city that Katchor has made his own. Published by Pantheon in 2003, this collection is a genuine pleasure for anyone who's ever felt the strange pull of a city block at dusk.