Gaia (Ultimate Collection) | Assouline

Guy Laliberté, founder of Cirque du Soleil, documents his experience in space in the first-ever book of photography published by a private space explorer. Featuring his photographs of Earth—as seen from the International Space Station—this evocative piece showcases Laliberté’s captivation with Earth’s surface, showing the colors and textures of 40 countries visible from 220 miles away. Traveling at 17,500 miles per hour, while making 16 tours of the earth every day, this photographer in motion and his “stable” subject made for truly original conditions. Using the Nikon D3S and Nikon D3X digital-SLR cameras, Laliberté shares 300 pages of images in which deserts resemble contemporary abstract paintings, cities rise up like mini mountain ranges, and faces and figures are revealed in nature. For the first time ever, ASSOULINE introduces a book with adjacent bi-lingual text (both French and English) in three unique formats: a trade edition in hardcover; a limited-release Ultimate Collection, in a fabric-covered clamshell presentation box; and, most exclusively, an artist’s limited luxury handbound edition in extra-large format, complete with a cloth debossed cover and silver foil accents to illustrate the diversity of the images. Complimentary white gloves and signature canvas tote bag are included with each purchase from Assouline’s Ultimate Collection Laliberté dedicated his personal spaceflight to raising awareness about water issues facing humankind, making his the first—in his own words—“poetic social mission” in space. Proceeds from book sales go to One Drop, a nonprofit organization initiated by Laliberté to fight poverty worldwide by ensuring that everyone across the planet has access to clean water, now and in the future.