On the Couch: Volume One
A 2002 book of erotic male portraiture in which Tom Bianchi photographs men on one couch in his living room, first of two volumes under the title On the Couch.
Bruno Gmünder of Berlin published the hardcover in April 2002. It runs 104 pages, mixes colour and black-and-white photographs, and carries its text in English and German. The sitters appear alone or with a partner, some clothed at the start and all eventually nude, and the accompanying text describes how the pictures were made. A second volume followed in 2004, and Bianchi's own site presents both as one series.
Bianchi (b. 1945, Oak Park, Illinois) practiced corporate law for a decade and left a post as senior counsel at Columbia Pictures at 34 to become an artist. His male nude photography includes Out of the Studio (St. Martin's Press, 1990) and the Polaroid archives Fire Island Pines, Polaroids 1975-1983 (Damiani, 2013) and 63 E 9th Street (Damiani, 2019). He lives in Palm Springs, California.
