Product Details
The Book of Tiki (Midsize)

The Book of Tiki (Midsize)
By Sven Kirsten

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Product Description

Tiki is the manifestation of exotic visions of island culture borrowed from tales told by American soldiers stationed in the South Pacific during World War II: trees loaded with exotic fruits, sleepy lagoons, white-sand beaches, and gorgeous people wearing grass feathers as they danced half-naked during all-night orgies of food and music. Americans seized these visions and incorporated fantasy into reality: mid-century fashion, popular music, eating and drinking, and even architecture were influenced by the Tiki trend.
This enlightening and hilarious guide casts the reader as an "urban archaeologist," exploring the lost remnants of the Tiki culture across the United States and discovering relics from this forgotten civilization in thrift stores, yard sales, and used book and record emporia. A combination of nostalgia and fascinating pop cultural study, this volume is a long overdue investigation into the cult of the Tiki. Almost makes you want to dig up those old grass skirts and throw luau

Product Details

  • Amazon Sales Rank: #621285 in Books
  • Published on: 2003-06-01
  • Original language: French, German, English
  • Number of items: 1
  • Binding: Paperback
  • 288 pages

Editorial Reviews

Review
Irreverent, fabulously fun, and packaged, as always with TASCHEN, beautifully. -- LA Weekly, 12/22/00

Sven Kirsten’s loving look at the post-war craze for all things Polynesian is filled with photos ... -- Travel Etc. Magazine, December 2000

The amazing world of Tiki has never been more lovingly and thoroughly documented. -- Paper Magazine, December 2000

Language Notes
Text: English, German, French (translation)
Original Language: English

Customer Reviews

it's tiki-tastic!5
What a fabulous book! The definitive book on tiki culture! I can't imagine that anyelse could ever surpass the excellent work done by Sven Kirsten. This book is truly a joy. I'll often rush through a new book but I took my time with this beauty. Entertaining, absorbing and stylish, it's just as much fun to merely look at as it is to read it. Each page is an adventure. I was impressed by the scope of the book - it deals with not just restaurants but with motels, apartment buildings, home entertaining, etc. Sven Kirsten also profiles the major innovators and originators of tiki culture. The best part is that the book is presented (tongue in cheek) as a guide to the urban archaeologist, interested in uncovering the remmnants and traces of the now-extinct tiki culture.

A must-have book!

A much needed effort5
Tiki worshipers -- we are not alone! Our friends at LuxuriaMusic.com live and breath Tiki, and the Millionaire has kindly written a thoughtful review on "The Book of Tiki." A notable excerpt from this is:

"Possibly the most difficult aspect of reviewing this comprehensive study of Polynesian pop is that it stands alone, unassailable. It's difficult to apply any critical distance to a work like this, and it's not that nothing else approaches its thoroughness or insight: the fact is that there is simply nothing else of the sort available. Whatsoever. Anywhere. Kirsten has literally "written the book" on a phase of pop culture that once encompassed architecture,interior design, clothing, music, food, entertainment and much more, yet passed from a ubiquitous vogue to decay and disregard without ever having enjoyed critical respect or even any substantial recognition.

Entertaining and educational5
It does not happen often that a new facet of American pop culture that has not been recognized before gets discovered. With his Book of Tiki Sven Kirsten succeeds in establishing a style that has been overlooked by art critics and historians alike. Through an amazing amount of visuals Kirsten proves how Tiki in it's heyday influenced every walk of American life, from architecture, design and graphics to food and drink.

In addition to the rich imagery (which affords the viewer an almost physical experience of the phenomenon) Kirsten's writing traces back the origins of the style to the Western fascination with Polynesia and, without becoming too analytical and dry, enlightens the reader on the motives for this escapism.
The chronicler's ironic enthusiasm for his subject saves him from becoming judgmental and falling for easy, politically correct conclusions.
We are guided through the history of Polynesia as an eternal metaphor for an earthly Eden up to the point where Americans fell in love with this vision.
Here Kirsten conveys how the post-war need for more moral freedom coincided with the tales of Pacific war theater veterans and the 50s idealization of Hawaii as a dream vacation destination.
In taking the guise of an urban archeologist who (as is done in classic archeology) discovers a lost culture through it's objects and artifacts, Kirsten accomplishes to throw light on a fascinating chapter of American pop that has so far lingered in obscurity.