A sample page from the new Public Collectors booklet Ambiguous Ads. Ambiguous Ads consists of scans of personal ads taken from issue number 38 of the swingers magazine Select, published in New Jersey in 1972. Issues of Select consist of thousands of ads for individuals or couples that swing and are seeking other swingers. Most of the ads in Select feature partially nude portraits that include the person’s face. Ambiguous Ads focuses on personal ads where the individual in the ad has somehow obscured their face. These are, perhaps, the swingers that were not quite ready to go public with their lifestyle choice. The ads were also accompanied by texts describing the kind of partner that each person (or couple) was looking for. Those texts have been omitted except for the location of the person depicted. More on this and other Public Collectors-related publications here.

A sample page from the new Public Collectors booklet Ambiguous Ads.

Ambiguous Ads consists of scans of personal ads taken from issue number 38 of the swingers magazine Select, published in New Jersey in 1972. Issues of Select consist of thousands of ads for individuals or couples that swing and are seeking other swingers. Most of the ads in Select feature partially nude portraits that include the person’s face. Ambiguous Ads focuses on personal ads where the individual in the ad has somehow obscured their face. These are, perhaps, the swingers that were not quite ready to go public with their lifestyle choice. The ads were also accompanied by texts describing the kind of partner that each person (or couple) was looking for. Those texts have been omitted except for the location of the person depicted.

More on this and other Public Collectors-related publications here.

Tags: Public Collectors Marc Fischer Ambiguous Ads Swingers photography books