After the deaths of her husband Fred Smith, her brother Todd, and her original keyboard player Richard Sohl, Patti Smith was urged by her famous friends Michael Stipe of REM and Allen Ginsberg (who readers of Just Kids will remember she met in her early days in New York City) to go back on the road. For two weeks in 1995, Stipe followed Smith while she toured with Bob Dylan, chronicling the experience in his intimate visual diary Two Times Intro: On the Road with Patti Smith. While the book serves as a document of a beginning — Smith’s re-emergence as a touring musician, its reprinting by Akashic also coincides with a musical demise — the recent break up of REM. Click through to see some of Stipe’s photos, and let us know in the comments if you think he shows potential for exploring his art in this new medium.
Patti Smith © Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
Allen Ginsberg © Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books
© Michael Stipe. Courtesy of the artist and Akashic Books