After releasing two critically acclaimed documents on youth culture Glen E. Friedman delivers a collection of intense and vital visions from 20 years behind the camera. The Idealist- 20 Years In My Eyes transcends the typical artbook as a visual testimony to Friedman's own personal search for his "ideal". Impossibly concerned and environmentally oriented, Friedman's realization that processing one roll of 3mm film produces gallons of chemically tainted fluid encourages him to consider each and every photo opportunity carefully, the common question- 'Does this shot really need to exist?' Absolutely , according to many, including Aperture which finds in Friedman's photography "a sense of being a participant in the pictures action... it's this clear sens of participation that makes these pictures work, and gives them theiur edge." The 100+ photographs further the concentrated emotion of his two previous works displaying the development of the Idealist character- one who makes a difference. The book also contains written contributions on Idealisim by Ian MacKaye and Ian Svenonious and critical analysis by C.R. Steyck III and Rita Luchetti-Bartoli.