Eleanor Roosevelt said, "Many people will walk in and out of your life, but only true friends will leave footprints on your heart.” In this stunning series of photographic essays on the nature of friendship, more than 100 world-class photographers have contributed moments in time, captured on film, of all the faces of friendship.

The images in this book are part of the M.I.L.K. Collection and were selected from more than 40,000 entries from around the world. Some feature very young faces, some very old; dark skins and light skins, colorful costumes and somber garb–they all have one thing in common: they are having their picture made with their best friend. It is the obvious warmth between the people, not their glamour or lack of it, that makes these photographs memorable. In her prologue, Maeve Binchy sums it up: “If you asked me, I would find it hard to tell you because, if they are friends, all I see are their smiling faces, their eager enthusiasm waiting to hear or say the next thing, their belief that I am good news also. I couldn’t say that one was a little fat bald man, or another a stunning elegant woman who looks 10 years younger than she is. These things don’t enter into it.”

The sheer joy on the faces displayed in FRIENDSHIP make their point clearer than words, across any barrier of language or nationality or age.

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