Your favorite, number 1, best, street photography/journalism book?

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timothyd

TimothyD
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I'm starting to form my little collection of photo books. I have credit at Dashwood Books and went in the other day to get a few new books. But I found myself unable to decide which ones. I did get the Koudelka Retrospective, which is great. The photographs are mostly his more famous ones, but I really liked the text/interviews.

So what are your favorite street photography/journalism books? Or looking at the dashwood site, what would you buy?

Thanks.
 
Buy a text book on cultural anthropology. Learn about people, the different ways they've developed to interact with one another. You need to understand your subjects most of all. Looking at photography books can be inspiring but the last thing you want to do is copy somebody's style.
 
Henri Cartier-Bresson, Photographer.

Add: Sebastiao Salgado, Workers. Elliott Erwitt, Snaps.
 
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By the way Tim...excellent photography on your website. And I LIKE the graininess!

Look at anything by Andre Kertesz if you want to learn about composition.
 
I'm surprised no one has mentioned Robert Frank's The Americans.
Click to expand...

Agreed, I bought the french version (Les Americains) though since all I could get in Germany was a 160 Euro original of The Americans.
 
thanks so much for your replies. I actually already have The Americans.

Dashwood Books has the following by the photographers you guys suggested:

Friedlander-Photographs, Frederick Law Olmsted Landscapes
Rat Hole
Kitaj
Self Portrait
Blind Spot (featuring friedlander, among others)
Nudes

Salgado-Portfolio

Erwitt-photographs and anti-photographs

Depardon-Hivers
Sites et Jeux
En Afrique
San Clemente
Our Farm
La solitude heureuse du voyageur notes

Freed-La Danse des Fideles

Kertesz-The Early Years
The New Vision (featuring Kertesz, among others. By the Metropolitan Museum of Art)

Frank-Flamingo
Come Again
The Lines of My Hand
Me and My Brother
Flower is
Zero Mostel reads a book
Hold Still Keep Going
Paris
Thank You
Ideas/Aspesi

Morath-Saul Steinbergs Masken und andere fotobilder

Winogrand is all out of stock.

What do you think?
 
The creator of this thread didn't ask for photo lessons !! ;)
Sounds like he was just looking for a good book "photojournalism style".
 
Erwitt's Snaps, Jonas Bendiksen - Satellites, Paolo Pellegrin - As I was dying, Luc Delahaye - Winterreise, Stanley Greene - Chechnya, an open wound (or something like that)... Those are some great ones.
 
Magnum Magnum by Brigitte Lardinois - 60th founding anniversary book of Magnum Photo Agency.

My second choice would be:

Magnum's First - by Achim Heine and Peter Koeln

My third choice would be:

I, Tokyo - by Jacob Aue Sobol
 
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@Martin: The Americans was newly published in Germany last year. For about 30 Euros, I think. Saw it in Berlin.
 
Don't know if it's my number 1, best book, but Saul Leiter's Early Color is really good. The recent Helen Levitt collection is fantastic too.
 
The book I can't stop looking at lately is Cartier Bresson's "Europeans". Robert Frank's "The Americans" is also a stunning volume, of course. For those who can get to Washington DC before the end of March, there is an incredible exhibition of "The Americans" up right now at the National Gallery of Art. Not only do they have prints of every image from the book (many of them Franks own vintage prints), but they have LOADS of supporting material, including lots of his original contact sheets, many prints that didn't make it into the book, and three rooms featuring lots of Frank's earlier work to provide some context before you get to the galleries with the "Americans" work. The exhibition is also exceptionally well curated. There is plenty of wonderful supporting material and written information which provides plenty of biographical details as well as context for and analysis of the work. There are also some wonderful handmade books on display that Frank made early in his career, including one he made for his first wife, as well as several others that were made as early portfolios. Also on display are several original copies of "The Americans", in different editions for various markets. Not only is the work incredible, but the curating and execution of this exhibition is some of the best I've ever seen. All in all, well worth seeing- even worth making a trip to Washington just for this.
 
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