Elvis who? was photographerAlfred Wertheimers response when, in early1956, RCA Victor asked him to photograph an up-and-coming crooner from Memphis. Little did Wertheimer know that this would be the job of his life: just 21 years old,Elvis Presleywas as we now know about to become a legend.A fly on the wall in Presley's presence,Wertheimer took nearly 3,000 photographs of Elvis that year, creating a penetrating portrait of a man poised on the brink of superstardom. Extraordinary in its intimacy and unparalleled in its scope, Wertheimer's Elvis projectimmortalized a young man in the very process of making history.Elvis and the Birth of Rock and Rollcollects Wertheimer s most remarkable Elvis shots from that magical year, along with a selection of his historic 1958 pictures of the star being shipped off to an army base in Germany.Each chapter is illustrated with a poster by Hatch Show Print, one of the oldest letterpress print shops in America, which created many early Elvis posters in the 1950s.
