Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3019 in Books
• Published on: 2007-09-07
• Format: Illustrated
• Binding: Hardcover
• 256 pages

Synopsis
Accompanying the first major television history of this ever more influential art form, this landmark book explores the key events and the key images that have marked the development of photography. At the heart of the book is a quest to understand what makes a truly great photograph. What is it that makes a photograph by Nan Goldin or Henri Cartier-Bresson stand out among the millions of others taken by all of us every single day? Why are some photographs elevated to the status of art - even after the event? "The Story of Photography" examines the evolution of photography in its wider context: social, political, economic, technological and artistic. It brings a critical perspective and a strong aesthetic sense to the subject, but above all it is primarily a narrative history. Beginning with the earliest days of the photograph in the 1840s and ending with an examination of the state of photography today and the effect that the 'digital revolution' will have, changing not only how we look at a photograph, but what it is in a physical sense. The book examines all the different genres of photography from art, news and reportage, landscape and portrait photography.

It also tells the great stories behind many of the world's most iconic photographs and reveals the extraordinary characters - from Margaret Bourke-White to Cindy Sherman and from Louis Daguerre to Robert Capa who have made and defined this art form. And it explores the forces and contemporary resonances that have given these images their meaning and power.

Customer Reviews

An excellent cultural guide.
This book is an excellent guide to the culture of photography, examining various significant photographers, mostly 20th century. There could be more actual photographs but the text is intelligently written, making interesting links between various movements and styles. It tends to jump around the timeline a bit but is all the more interesting for that. Overall, a very good, if possibly subjective, view of photographic history which does not become bogged down in academia.

An excellent read
I don't normally go for TV tie-in books but this book is an excellent read, and it makes you think about what photography all about.

The pictures are mainly the same as the TV series but photographs don't come over well on the box, far better to appreciate them reproduced properly and with time to see them properly.

It is a good introduction to many previously little known photographers and I was sorry when I had finished reading it as I would have liked more of the same!