Henry Wessel: Hitchhike (Steidl, Göttingen) is an 80-page hardcover photobook by the late American photographer Henry Wessel (1942–2018), a key figure of the New Topographics movement. In 1960, Wessel left New Jersey for college in central Pennsylvania, having never been further west than Philadelphia. On Friday afternoons he would hitchhike west, then cross the highway on Saturday and thumb his way back in time for Monday classes. Those early journeys shaped a lifetime of looking. Drawn from his fifty-year archive, Hitchhike is a carefully sequenced journey west, from the green farmlands of the Midwest to the wide, dusty open landscapes beyond. The photographs are full of Wessel’s trademark light, wit and quiet attention to everyday American life. It is an essential addition for collectors of American landscape and documentary photography.