Between Two Rivers brings together a sequence of photographs by An-My Lê that reflect on landscape, history, and the quiet presence of conflict embedded within place. Moving between sites in Vietnam and the United States, Lê photographs environments that carry the residue of war, memory, and national mythology.

Rather than documenting action, Lê focuses on stillness — rivers, forests, training grounds, and landscapes where the past lingers just beneath the surface. Her images are carefully composed and often expansive, inviting viewers to slow down and consider how geography shapes both personal memory and collective history.

Across the book, the landscape becomes a stage where traces of human activity remain — subtle, distant, and sometimes barely visible. Between Two Rivers continues Lê’s long-standing photographic investigation into how war is remembered, reenacted, and absorbed into the terrain itself.

Quiet, observational, and deeply attentive to place, the book is both a meditation on landscape photography and a reflection on the layered relationship between history and environment.

Artist: An-My Lê

Publisher: MoMA

Format: Hardcover

Dimensions: 10 × 12 inches (approx.)

Page Count: 167 pages

Printing: Offset printed, full-color reproductions

Binding: Casebound

Language: English

Release Year: 2023

Some photographs ask you to look harder. Others ask you to slow down.

An-My Lê’s work sits firmly in the second category.

Between Two Rivers is built around patience — wide landscapes, careful framing, and the quiet tension that exists in places shaped by history. Nothing in these images is rushed. The camera holds steady, allowing small details — distant figures, altered terrain, the edge of a river — to slowly reveal themselves.

For photographers, the book is a reminder of how powerful restraint can be. Landscape here isn’t just scenery; it becomes a way of thinking about time, memory, and the traces people leave behind.

It’s a photobook that rewards returning to it again and again.