latest additions to your library

It was actually last summer that I picked it up but I since put almost everything into storage and forgot about my recent photo book purchase. I got a hard bound copy of "Protest" by Benedict Fernandez.

I find myself trolling book stores across the nation, from the NYC metro area to New Mexico, and from New Mexico to Portland, including all points between, hoping that I'll find a hard bound copy of "Vietnam Inc" by Philip Jones Griffiths. I know it's been out of print for years and is extraordinarily hard to find at an affordable price but I buy books partially for the hunt as well as what they contain. Discovering a book at an estate sale, thrift store or used book store is so much more satisfying than just ordering off of Amazon, in my opinion. I found a second printing of "Kidnapped" by Robert Louis Stevenson that way. As well as a 19th century hardbound collection of Longfellow poetry and a first printing copy of "Yankee Nomad" by David D. Duncan. That one even has the errata notes that should have fallen out a few decades ago.

Phil Forrest
 
I think the first "Vietnam Inc" was only available as a soft cover (never seen a hard cover of it). There was a re-print in hardcover some years ago - and that one should be fairly easy to find. I have both and the reprint is a better print job (but the I had the soft cover version signed by PJG when he was in Vancouver many years ago).
 
William Klein: Life is Good & Good for You in New York (Books on Books)

Nobuyoshi Araki: The Banquet: Books on Books No. 15

Magnum Contact Sheets
 
I just found an almost complete set of "Library of Photography" by Time-Life (ca.1970s) at a thrift store for $12 I'm pretty happy about that, the prints in the books are beautiful!
 
The Afronauts by Cristina de Middel (info).

This photobook has gone ballistic, and been showered with accolades since its publication this summer. I managed to get the last copy from the photographer, which she kindly signed for me.

The trouble with photobooks today is that they're becoming increasingly collected, and the price can quickly reach stupid levels. I bought The Afronauts for £40 ($60) but six months later it's impossible to find anywhere at a sensible price: one sold before Xmas for £600 ($900), and there's now only one copy available online (at Amazon), selling for an eye-watering £950 ($1450)!

There's a few recent photobooks that I would have bought if I knew about them at the time of publication but which are now far too expensive for me. For example, Trent Parke's Bedknobs & Broomsticks came out just 2 years ago, in 2010, for about £20 ($30) but now sells for over £150 ($250)!
 
Vivian Maier "Street Photographer" and "Out of the Shadows". Is there a lot of overlap with regards to the published pictures? What do you think is the 'better' book? Many thanks for your feedback! Peter
 
John Szarkowski - Atget
I always enjoy reading Szarkowski's commentary. The reproduction quality is very good (I saw the Atget exhibition last year when it visited Sydney). An interesting, quality book filled with fascinating images.

Walker Evans: American Photographs
I bought this on recommendation from TOP. I wasn't very familiar with Evans' work and this seems to be a good starting point. Reproduction quality is good, rather than outstanding.
 
After trying to find my copies of Bill Bryson's "The Lost Continent", and William Least Heat Moon's "Blue Highways", I headed to the book store and bought new ones. I have a tendency to loan books to my friends and students, then forget who has what, so I add to their library as well as mine. Also picked up a new edition of "Wisconsin Death Trip" to replace a rather threadbare copy, as well as "The Photographer's Eye", by Szarkowski. It's cold and snowy and New Year's Eve, and my wife and I are letting the amateur drinkers take their turn at defiling light posts and curbs while we sit with our drinks and books, enjoying each other's company immensely. Have just finished chortling my way around America with Bryson, and am headed on to Blue Highways now...

Happy New Year, and good reading!

Mark
 
Bound for Glory

Bound for Glory

lynnb said:
Walker Evans: American Photographs
I bought this on recommendation from TOP. I wasn't very familiar with Evans' work and this seems to be a good starting point. Reproduction quality is good, rather than outstanding.
Click to expand...

I bought that book some time ago, when the new anniversary version came out. It contains many impressive photographs.

Another book going in a similar direction is a collection of photographs from documenting american life of farmers, citizens, war preparations and the like, initiated by the FSA/OWI (Farm Security Administration / Office of War Information). The book is called "Bound for Glory" and contains photographs from 1939 - 1943. The really impressive images in the book are made with the then brand new Kodachrome film and many of the images are simply mind blowing. My copy is a book from the Library of Congress from 2004 and the print quality is outstanding. It was by far my best christmas present this year from my wife. I can really recommend that book. Some sample pictures can be seen here:

http://www.good.is/posts/slideshow-kodachrome-slides-from-the-farm-security-administration/

Also, all photographs (not only from the book, but all of the FSA/OWI-collection can be viewed online for free here:

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/fsahtml/fahome.html
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/fsachtml/fsowhome.html

But since they make it very annoying to browse the images, I still recommend the book.

PS: I think, there should be a US-government law, to reanimate Kodachrome and make it available to the world for the next hundred years... ;)
 
lynnb said:
Walker Evans: American Photographs
I bought this on recommendation from TOP. I wasn't very familiar with Evans' work and this seems to be a good starting point. Reproduction quality is good, rather than outstanding.
Click to expand...
They made a big attempt using digital files to reproduce the original 1938 book (see pp. 204-5), maybe that accounts for some of it.

I've become a big fan over the last couple of years since I was given Many are Called, Yale University Press, New Haven, 2004 ISBN 978-0300106176. That's a wonderful book, as is Lyric Documentary, Steidl, Gottingen, 2006 ISBN 978-3865210227. The reproduction quality in both books is much better than that in American Photographs.

You might be really interested in Walker Evans at Work, Harper & Row, New York, 1982 ISBN 0-06-011104-6. It has lots of chronological pictures but the focus of the book is to show how Evans got to a final image through trial and error. If you like contact sheets you'll love it, as it shows him working around a subject, changing lenses, working with the light and even using different cameras as he looked for the visual effect he had in his mind. There are all sorts of notes interspersed with the pictures on his thoughts, insurance for his gear, advice, proposals and brief transcripts of interviews. A most unusual book that I like a lot, you might like it too.
 
Got two photography related books for Christmas:

Aperture Masters of Photography - HCB

and

Daido Moriyama - Labyrinth
(still need to get a loupe for this one :D )
 
Got Grim Street by Mark Cohen and French Kiss by Anders Petersen for christmas.

Had a rare trip to London in early December and picked up the following...

The Chinese - Liu Zheng
Rome - William Klein
Hasselblad Award - Malick Sidibe
Cartier-Bresson: A Question of Colour - Catalogue of the exhibition on at Somerset House
Case History - Boris Mikhailov

I'm terrible for buying photobooks - I bought BookCAT a few months ago to keep a track of them all. Finally finished entering all my books into the database over christmas - I have over 360 photobooks!!

Further to what Rich was saying about the availability and price of photobooks once they go out of print - I'm astounded by what some of my books are 'worth' (the price for a 'new' or 'like new' on Amazon - which is not necessarily what they are worth!). I bought 'Colour Correction' by Ernst Haas in late 2011 (the book was printed in 2011 by Steidl) for £38 - you now have to pay £502 for a new one from Amazon!

To sum up - to replace my photobook collection I would have to pay 4 times what I originally paid.

Cheers and happy new year
Simon
 
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