In the latest book, “Streets of America”, Chris took on the impressive feat of visiting 23 cities in an 80 day coast-to-coast adventure. As such, there’s San Francisco, New York, New Orleans, Atlanta, Nashville, Boston, Philadelphia and many more to take in.

With a tenacity that is rare to find for this kind of work, there’s hundreds of images published in the book, and I’m pleased that Chris has shared a selection with us here. 

I also asked him to share some insights into how he works – I’m exhausted just reading about his days pounding the streets in search of the perfect shot, but it does show that perseverance truly pays off.

In this year of the new Trump era beginning, and a very divided nation, there’s potentially never been more attention focused on our friends in the States, but on the whole this is a very positive book. Read on to find out more… 

AP: How did you decide which cities you wanted to include in your tour?

CP: When asked why he stole from banks, the notorious American robber Willie Sutton retorted, ‘because that’s where the money is’! So, like most street photographers I headed for the big cities and I was also influenced by popular culture as seen on TV and Hollywood. Having watched ‘Breaking Bad’ I checked out Albuquerque and Santa Fe on Route 66, but was disappointed as it was a quiet day with few characters about. A local online travel counsellor who knew America well, helped me plan with a very flexible itinerary. She would book some flights and hotels in advance of my next city, so avoiding dodgy areas and saving me from wandering the streets with a heavy rucksack late at night.  

AP: Were there any places you didn’t go to but wished you had?

CP: Inevitably in such a vast country my project was just a snapshot, but with hindsight there definitely was. Places such as El Paso on the Texas and Mexico border to try and reflect that centre of political controversy, for example. I also wanted to capture some of the election campaigning, but on my first visit in the spring of 2023, it was just warming up. However, in April 2024 I did witness pro and anti Trump protesters clashing outside the Supreme Court in Washington. I wish I had gone into the rural heartlands and swing States and also Miami but I ran out of time and money. I needed a year to do the project any sort of justice… perhaps I should have gone to Niagara Falls but reckoned I would just get soaked or, perhaps at Grand Canyon where I might see a few tourists admiring the view.

AP: What were your highlights? Will you be going back to any of them? 

CP: I wanted to see more of the old America, so Fort Worth in Texas was perfect with its cowboys but unfortunately no rodeo. However, an added bonus was capturing a crowd gazing up at a total eclipse of the sun. 

In spring 2023 I went for 50 days including Las Vegas where I just couldn’t get my mojo working in a search for some tacky Parr-esque images. I am glad I returned a year later for an extra 30 days and was rewarded by snapping a very drunk Elvis in a buggy on an escalator.

I loved Nashville – it was packed and buzzing with music filling the streets. But it was sadly marred by another mass shooting close by. Then an amazing coincidence happened while waiting for an Uber outside my hotel. A couple asked where I was from and on replying “Peterborough”, a man in the queue said he was too and that I had taken his picture 40 years ago and again in 2022 for my Reunions 2 book.

It was important that I reflected the national obsession with baseball which was not easy as some stadiums banned ‘professional-looking cameras or longer lenses, although ironically camera phones were not a problem. Fortunately, I managed to capture games in Pittsburgh and Cleveland.

The poignant Washington Vietnam war memorial where I saw relatives searching amongst the 50,000 names for their loved ones. Nearby, the impressive Martin Luther King sculpture brought to mind ‘I have dream’  and the long struggle for civil rights. My image of two children in Baltimore holding hands sums it up for me. That night I was asleep in my hotel while around the corner six people were injured in a nightclub shooting. 

Walking miles around a baking hot and tourist-packed Washington, I spotted a lone police officer guarding the steps of the Capitol building, cocooned in sheets and scaffolding. As I reflected on the attempted coup of January 6th 2021 a genial man and gun owner informed me the attack was all staged by the FBI and that the Sandy Hook school shootings was the work of paid actors!

Not exactly a highlight but just as memorable was in New York and just before my night flight home, when I ran after a dog wearing a pink tutu and went flying. Cradling my ‘baby’, I landed smack on my jaw in a square of hard mud where a tree had once grown. I was lucky that I managed to avoid using the American health system and the dental damage could wait until my beloved NHS sorted me out. To add insult to injury, I missed the picture too!  

At almost 72 I will probably not return and there’s plenty in dear old Blighty to keep me busy. 

AP: Did you find that the cities had lots in common, or were they all quite different? 

CP: New York ‘the city that never sleeps’ is a street photographer’s paradise where you are spoiled for choice with great characters and backdrops. In other big cities, such as Dallas or Detroit I found the same kind of photography particularly hard as the car is king. The cities are devoted to massive multi-storey and subterranean car parks, valet parking, wide roads and pavements that are devoid of people in some dystopian concrete jungle. Noxious fumes belched from enormous tank like vehicles with their drivers concealed behind darkened glass. Most buildings were also obscured, and it is only on opening a door you realise what’s inside and where all the people were. I walked miles through litter-strewn streets unsuccessfully trying to avoid human excrement; passing by shop security guards armed with guns and tasers.

I didn’t want to overdo images of the dispossessed but I had to reflect what I was seeing in front of me. I was saddened to witness the shocking effects of the opioid crisis on fellow human beings. Like scenes from a zombie movie they staggered around, ranting and raving, lying comatose in doorways and gutters, rags hanging off them, exposing festering sores on oedematous limbs. These scenes were replicated in other cities such as Hollywood with tents on sidewalks alongside the red carpets of Oscar night. In the US, there’s simply no safety net. In Britain, we have problems but fortunately we still have a welfare state and it shows. 

AP: How do you find the streets of the US compare with the streets of the UK and Europe? 

CP: In 2023, I landed in San Francisco to an inauspicious start. On a filthy graffiti-covered airport shuttle train to downtown, a man sat behind me shouting, ‘I want to stab something.’ Then, with a large pair of red scissors, he destroyed his seat. Camera-in-hand I was tempted, but took my cue from sensible locals who had already moved to the next carriage to await the police. Our tube feels safe and pristine by comparison. 

I don’t want to make sweeping generalisations but there are stark contrasts to some of the US cities. In Europe, it’s probably why Venice is one of my favourites – simply because of the refreshing absence of cars.

AP: You say you don’t know necessarily what it is you’re looking for when you go out – but are you going out looking for “moments” or do you just see if you get lucky? 

CP: You do make your own luck and street photography is about walking many miles and letting serendipity play its role. As with my multi coloured punks from the eighties, I still look out for characters who stand out from the madding crowd and humorous juxtapositions and interactions that are often missed. A bit like fishing where I would walk all day without a bite, tired and despondent and about to go home when suddenly, out of the blue, on walks Philly Man who was made for the front cover!

AP: How long do you spend each day (roughly) walking around waiting for something to catch your eye? Do you tend to stay in one place and let action unfold in front of you or do you approach it differently?

CP: “All the worlds a stage, and all the men and women merely players; They have their exits and their entrances.” So I wait and wait, and if no joy I find another stage. How do you capture those iconic places that have been photographed millions of times in a different way? For me, it is about finding the right character to match.

I probably spend a minimum of twelve hours walking up to twenty miles hunting for that decisive and elusive moment. In fact, I walked over seven hundred miles, along with thousands of miles on slow infrequent Amtrak trains, Greyhound coaches and inevitably planes to save time 

AP: Did people mind you photographing? Do you think you have a different viewpoint/vantage point as an outsider, compared to say when you’re photographing in the UK?

CP: I get into lost tourist mode, and not being a street photography purist I do a mixture of candid and engagement. In fact, I often provoke eye contact as it usually produces a stronger picture. Worry about the response from strangers is the main reason given for not pursuing street photography but I have rarely had problems. Most are flattered and I find a smile and an explanation goes a long way.

AP: Can you tell us about the gear that you use? 

CP: In the eighties, I was a bit shyer, so I did some telephoto work but I now realise the social context such as the shops is crucial. I try to adopt the maxim of one of my photojournalist heroes, Robert Capa: “If your photograph is not good enough, then you are not close enough.” Tragically he got too close in Indochina! I use a Canon 5D Mark III and EF 24 – 70 mm f/2.8 L USM lens. I thought getting a compact Fuji X100 would make me a less conspicuous, a better photographer and produce better images. It didn’t!  

I must admit, when I walk around town, I rarely take the heavy gear now except for projects like my American trip. I was a bit sniffy about mobile phones and despite the limitations of no viewfinder and overriding settings, I am beginning to appreciate the advantages. The quality is so good with raw shooting available too and its always with you.  

AP: Do you tend to shoot in one particular mode? 

CP: My former career as a paramedic taught me to be always ready to respond immediately to the unexpected. To seize the moment before it has gone. So it is with street photography and why my best shot ever was in Union Square New York of a leaping collie dog. I actually shot from my chest and would have been gutted had it been blurred or out of focus.

My camera is always set on aperture priority at a fast shutter speed and small aperture. Say a minimum of about  800 -1000 sec at around f8 or more. The lens is usually at the 24 -28 end and I use my feet as a zoom. I move around the subject as great potential pictures are usually ruined by messy backgrounds that ruin your composition with sticking out limbs and polybags. 

I use manual ISO, upping it if needed as it’s better to have a bit of noise than a blurred image. It’s crucial to have a filter on to protect the lens and sometimes a lens hood, although being careful of vignetting when it slips. Always check for raindrops, as I find they will always end up in middle of the face!  Focus points I often set at max for quick grab shots of general crowds and individual points for more precision. 

Additionally, I shoot on rapid burst mode too with raw and jpegs. Shooting sometimes from crazy angles to give impact, I avoid harsh sunlight by walking on the shady side of the street. I’m constantly scanning the horizon and rechecking settings as somehow they move! I always carry spare charged batteries and memory cards, comfy shoes, rucksack with sarnies and water plus protective gear. 

It’s no good being a fair-weather photographer as the best shots are to be had where others fear to tread. Again, my old career comes into play with dangers first and watching your back. Avoiding dodgy ill lit alleys and dead ends. 

AP: Do you do any post-production to the pictures? 

CP: I am a bit of a technophobe (my age) so have to keep it basic. There’s no substitute for getting it right first time in camera, rather than roll it in glitter later. I learned more from the Sunday Times picture editor  Harold Evans seminal work ‘Pictures on a Page’ than any other photo book. Just simple cropping for instance can make such a difference to those grab shots. I see a potential picture and get a few in the can just in case and then wait for things to develop and maybe a better picture will emerge.

AP: Have you gotten any better at editing your own work? 

CP: Fortunately I had a little bit of help from my friends with constructive critique from a great mentor and former photo editor. He would look at my images and say rubbish, boring, so what, leaves me cold, delete, delete, delete! As I could not find a publisher, I was very lucky to find a great graphic designer who makes my photographs sing in the books and also distributes them for me too.

I am slowly learning that less is more and that viewers get bored with too many similar pictures which will dilute your strong ones. Sometimes just one strong picture can tell the story.

Unlike my early books, I have tried to curate more tightly and resisted the temptation to justify and include weaker images. For example, I walked around St Louis for two days without a decent picture so the city does not feature. Likewise, despite all the expense and effort to capture the iconic Golden Gate, I left empty handed. As you do with digital I took thousands of images but deleted the vast majority as they were technically poor or just boring. 

AP: What’s been the reaction to this book? 

CP: Despite the compromises I am pleased with the outcome and the print quality is great. The man featured sitting on the White House Wall holding a placard with ‘Hate will not make America Great’ is a retired Washington professor in his eighties. Frustrated with Trump, he has protested there most days for five years and upset with the result he has now returned to his vigil in winter. I asked him what he thought after receiving my book. He loved it but did not feel it reflected the very divided and angry America that he sees and feels. He has a point, but I replied that I hope it also shows a more positive and happier side of his country and what can be.  

The problem is the book at £15 is cheap enough, but it costs an extra £35 to send it to the States. So apart from to those who are actually in the book, I have sold very few there. Here in the UK, it is still quite niche although very topical. I hope this feature will appeal to AP readers who might then want to see more of my quirky take on America. It’s all for a good cause too, as part of the proceeds goes to Breast Cancer Research in memory of Lesley, the love of my life for fifty years.

AP: You’ve said that this is going to be your last book – why is that? 

CP: Along with just published Barking 2! (inspired by Elliot Erwitt) I have self-published ten books now. I do not have time for another Reunions project as I would be over a century, although cameras can be mounted to Zimmer frames! There is no substitute for the smell and feel of a photography book compared to a screen but they are very expensive to produce and time consuming to make.  

Never say never, but I feel it’s time for a different direction as I have honed my craft on the streets and now find street photography lacks purpose for me. I enjoy social documentary-type work, such as my NHS book homage ‘Just Be Kind’ which covers my forty seven year career. My then and now Reunions exhibition based on my two books proved very popular and was attended by over 11,000 in Peterborough. I have tried to garner London interest, but sadly to no avail. Hopefully one day, but not posthumously as you cannot read the reviews…. 

Commissions and projects perhaps such as the one at London Luton airport displaying my images over the past seven years, which enabled me to buy a decent camera. So any offers of expenses paid trips back to Europe or even America would be welcome while my legs and brain still work! Seize the moment!    

Streets of America is available to buy now. You can buy a copy for just £20 including postage (to the UK) by visiting chrisporsz.com. Barking 2! Is also available, priced at £13 including postage.

Related reading:

• Tips for striking street photography
• Chris Porsz: the inside story of the amazing street photography project ‘Reunions’
• How to set up your camera for street photography

Follow AP on Facebook, X, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok.

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In this list, I’ve tried to be as diverse as possible. I’ve included books across a range of genres and tastes, as well as those which include contemporary photography, and others which feature historic or archive work.

The books are presented in no particular order. It was hard enough to narrow it down to this list, let alone picking an outright “best”. That said, I was particularly struck this year by Lydia Goldblatt’s “Fugue”, a touching portrait of motherhood, childhood and grief. 

But of course, that won’t necessarily be to everybody’s taste. Other highlights for me include Sixty Years of Wildlife Photographer of the Year, Best Face Forward and Calling The Shots. 

We’d always be very keen to hear from readers about their favourite books, so please do let us know what you’ve been reading this year.

The Ocean Speaks by Matt Porteous and Tamsin Raine 

£28, White Lion Publishing, 240 pages, ISBN: 9780711288935

Over 70% of the Earth’s surface is covered with water, providing a home for 250,000 known species, as well as sustenance for billions of people. 

And yet, the health of our oceans has never been more under threat, from climate change, overfishing, pollution and habitat destruction. 

This book, the work of a charity called Ocean Culture Life, aims to raise awareness of these various issues and how they are being addressed. To do that, it contains more than 60 illustrated essays and stories told by 45 ocean experts.

Beautiful photography is a key pat of that of course. We get to explore kelp forests and shipwrecks off the coast of South Africa, accompany the divers who patrol the volcanic Ring of Fire beneath the Pacific, see sharks in the Maldives, rays in the Sea of Cortez, turtles in Malaysia and sperm whales in the Azores. 

The book’s authors have done a wonderful job of curating this collection, and it’s as gorgeous as it is important. 

Being There by Omar Victor Diop and The Anonymous Project 

£39, Textuel, 112 pages, hardback, ISBN: 9782845979444

In 2017, award-winning filmmaker Lee Shulman founded what has become of the largest collections of amateur photography in the world. The Anonymous Project features nearly a million Kodachrome slides, which consist mostly of American family photos taken in the 1940s, ‘50s, and ‘60s. he subjects are unknown, but the situations immediately familiar.

This collaboration with the acclaimed Senegalese self-portraitist Omar Victor Diop is a work of genius. In Being There, Omar is cleverly inserted into a selection of situations as if he were part of the family. The presence of an African man into domestic situations in white, middle-class, segregated America creates a series of absurd and often amusing scenes, made even more so by Omar’s interactions with the people in the photos. But, beneath the surreality, Being There makes a serious contribution to the ongoing conversation around race, privilege and exclusion.

The project took over a year to complete, and the pair say the response has been “overwhelming”. It’s certainly one of our favourite books of the year – it’s rare to see such a work of originality that also manages to combine serious issues and humour.

Creation – Masterpieces from the Natural World by Harry Skeggs 

£49.95, teNeues, hardcover, 256 pages, ISBN: 9783961415558

If you love wildlife photography, then Harry’s book is a masterful example of the genre. 

The book is divided into different chapters which document a variety of species from across the world. Each section is accompanied by text from Harry Skeggs, describing more about the animals shown, the habitat in which they live, the preparations necessary for the journey and the photoshoot, as well as the artistry behind certain stylistic and photographic choices.

It’s this combination of words and pictures that elevates the book to our list of best books this year. As photographers ourselves, we often want to know what goes into a picture, perhaps sometimes more so than the result itself. Here, we learn that admirably sometimes Harry would invest months, if not years, of preparation for each shot. 

That said, the results are of course stunning. Studying Fine Art at Cambridge is reflected in the clear influences the Great Masters have had on his compositions and choices. 

LIFE: Hollywood 

£200, Taschen, 708 pages, hardback (two volumes), ISBN: 9783836589598

This mammoth book – which is so big it comes in two volumes – is a real treasure. 

Although not cheap at £200, at over 700 pages, the cost to page ratio isn’t too bad… and this could easily be the only book you need to buy to see you through until next year.

Covering the glitziest period in Hollywood’s history, which just so happened to coincide with the production run of LIFE magazine, this is a veritable who’s who and what’s what of big names and productions from the 40s, 50s and 60s. 

Indeed, it’s the behind-the-scenes, documentary-style imagery here that I found particularly intriguing, more so than the typical glamorous Hollywood portraits (though I liked those too). 

An absolutely gorgeous book with something to devour on every page, this is a must-buy for collectors and aficionados. 

This Was Then by Mike Abrahams

£45, Bluecoat Press, Hardback, 160 pages, ISBN: 9781908457837

Spanning 1973 to 2001, through Prime Ministers Heath, Wilson, Callaghan, Thatcher, Major and Blair, this is a fascinating and masterfully created look at this era of British history.

Born in South Africa, Mike Abrahams moved to Liverpool aged 2 where he began taking pictures as a teenagers. Writing about this book in our 3 Sep issue, Peter Dench said, “it’s evident he’s moulded by the bomb-damaged, slum-ridden, impoverished environment of his youth. Driven by an unwavering curiosity, decades of wandering British streets to see what’s around the corner and behind doors of those living day to day in marginalised societies has followed.”

Each of the pictures in the book tells a story, but they’re also superbly composed and crafted. This isn’t really a surprise from the man who co-founded Network in 1981, an independent cooperatively-owned picture agency along with Steve Benbow, Chris Davies, Mike Goldwater, Barry Lewis, Judah Passow, Laurie Sparham and John Sturrock.

If you’re a sucker for monochrome, documentary, British history and more, this is an absolute must-have for this year. 

Fugue by Lydia Goldblatt 

£45, GOST, hardcover, 192 pages, ISBN: 9781915423405

When Lydia Goldblatt became a mother, she found herself unable to make pictures. But, when her own mother died, she started to take photographs at home and in the city where she lives. 

The result is Fugue, a wonderfully moving testament to the extraordinarily ordinary, shot with love, tenderness and of course the skill to notice that which is worthy of being documented at exactly the right moment. 

Shot on medium format film, the images have a certain quality that can be hard to fully replicate with digital. And more than that, not being able to instantly see the results of your photography gives them a real sense of slowness, of taking time, and intimacy that the rapid-fire of a digital shutter, with the temptation to try “just one more” often doesn’t afford.

The pictures are accompanied by text, which is beautiful and raw too. There are only flashes of Lydia herself in the images, a reflection here, or a shadow there, but the tenderness of her family life is beautifully captured.

This is a book which at first glance could appear to be quite ordinary, but if you really take the time to study the images, and appreciate them as a whole, it gives you plenty to think about and I found it very affecting.

60 Years of Wildlife Photographer of the Year: How Wildlife Photography Became Art

£40, Natural History Museum, hardcover, 336 pages, ISBN: 9780565095628

It’s amazing to think that the incredibly prestigious Wildlife Photographer of the Year has been running for 60 years now. How many amazing photographs have we seen during that time? Too many to count or mention, but in this fascinating book we get a glimpse of some of the wonderful pictures that have been competition winners and the stories behind them. 

The first ever winner was C V R Dowdeswell for his image of a tawny owl, and it was presented by none other than Sir David Attenborough. At that time, only 361 entries were submitted – today there are nearly 60,000.

This is another must for anybody interested in wildlife photography, especially as it charts how the genre has evolved and changed over the last six decades.

Best Face Forward by Gerry Badger 

£40, Prestel, Hardback, 240 pages, ISBN: 9783791393117

Now here’s one for all the people and portrait fans out there.

Curated by the always-excellent Gerry Badger, Best Face Forward brings together some of the world’s pre-eminent portraitists – from the early days of photography to the present day – to take a look at the thoughts, motivations, historical context and theories behind portrait photography. 

Each of the images is accompanied by a short essay by Gerry, but, you can of course just enjoy the images by themselves too if you like. 

With some of the biggest names you’ll definitely have heard of, along with a smattering of those you might not have, this is an excellent reference book which I know I’ll be coming back to many times when I’m looking for inspiration or information.

Calling The Shots: A Queer History of Photography

By Zorian Clayton, Lydia Caston and Hana Kaluznick

£40, Thames and Hudson, hardback, 240 pages, ISBN: 9780500480960

Drawing from the vast photography collection at the V&A, this book takes a broad and bold look at the history of photography as told through a Queer lens. 

Spread across six thematic chapters, along with five artist-in-focus sections, we see images from pioneering LGBTQIA+ photographers (and their subjects). 

With more than 200 images, we get explorations of identity, examinations of the self, what it’s like to live your everyday life as part of this community, and just a dash of fantastical fiction. 

There are some huge names from photography and art here. If you’re keen to read more about the history of photography – and want to do it as diversely as possible, then this is an absolute must-read. 

Magnum America: The United States, edited by Peter van Agtmal and Laura Wexlar

£125, Thames and Hudson, hardback, 472 pages, ISBN: 9780500544563

With all eyes on the USA this year during the Presidential Election, it was perhaps the obvious time to bring out this book.

This large-format, 472-page, epic tome spans the Magnum Archive from the 1940s to the present day. The result is a completely compelling look at the country, from sociological, political and historical perspectives. And then of course, there’s just some darn good imagey too.

Presented as a timeline, there’s just about every big American event of the past 80 years, with some of the world’s most lauded photographers. 

This is another expensive – but expansive – book, but, if you love documentary and history photography, there can be few better recommendations from recent years.

Best of the rest 

Gulag by Barry Lewis

£40, Fistful of Books, hardback, 128 pages, ISBN: 9781838186036

In 1991, during the dying days of the former USSR, Barry Lewis was commissioned by Geo Magazine to visit the Gulag of Siberia. The results of which are seen some 33 years later in this wonderfully fascinating book. Shot in Kodachrome, it’s almost hyperreal in its delivery. A real masterclass in documentary photography of a subject usually kept under wraps.

Camo by Thandiwe Muriu 

£30, Chronicle Books, hardback, 192 pages, ISBN: 9781797230016

One of the most exciting visual artists working today, Camo is a gorgeous and bold book where every image leaps from the page. It seems unlikely that you’ll find anything brighter in our list, so if you want pure unparalleled joy – which also contains a message about what it is to be a woman, and to be African – then it comes hugely recommended.

Beyond the Selfie: The Art of Self Portraiture in the Digital Age by Rosie Hardy 

£22, Ilex Press, hardback, 224 pages, ISBN: 9781781579381

Rosie’s creative self-portraits have gained her over 170,000 followers on Instagram. Blending elements of unreality with her selfies, her work strikes a chord with the audience because they draw on emotion from real life. An inspirational book that explores the modern fascination with the self(ie) and is lots of fun too.

Cartomania: Photography and Celebrity in the Nineteenth Century by Paul Frecker

£40, September Publishing, hardback, 480 pages, ISBN: 9781914613623

This one’s for all the history lovers. Cartomania charts the Victorian craze for collecting miniature portraits. It explores eccentric characters such as Rossa Richtor, who appeared as a Human Cannonball at London’s Royal Aquarium. A quirky, weird and fascinating collection that is not to be missed.

An Illustrated History of Snapshot Photography – From a Victorian Craze to the Digital Age by John Wade 

£29.99, Pen&Sword History, hardcover, 224 pages, ISBN: 9781399079150

AP regular John Wade’s latest book shows off his encyclopaedic knowledge of photographic history, this time the “snapshot”. Wonderfully put together and illustrated, we get a look at the very first snapshot cameras, all the way up to the digital age. 

Acts of Creation: On Art and Motherhood by Hettie Judah 

£30, Thames & Hudson, 272 pages, Hardback, ISBN: 9780500027868

Looking at how motherhood has been depicted throughout history, as well as how mothers have created art in conjunction with their own experiences of parenthood this was one of my favourite books of the year. It’s mainly concerned with traditional art forms, but there’s a fair amount of photography too.

The African Gaze: Photography, Cinema and Power by Amy Sall and Yasmina Price

£45, Thames and Hudson, hardcover, 288 pages, ISBN: 9780500025390

If you’ve been keen to educate yourself on the history of African photography, but haven’t been entirely sure where to begin, a book like this is an absolute gift. It’s a comprehensive exploration of postcolonial and contemporary photography from Africa, drawing on extensive archival imagery and documents, as well as the photographers and filmmakers featured.

Still by Mary Jo Hoffman 

£39.95, The Monacelli Press, 318 pages, hardcover, ISBN: 9781580936330

A culmination of Mary Jo’s 12 year project to photograph “found nature” every single day. With no subject too small or too ordinary, 275 of the stunning photographs from the projects make its way into this gorgeous book. An inspirational tale in so many ways, it’s ideal for those interested in still life and long-term projects.

Naturally, although we do our best to cover every photography book published, we can’t possibly hope to spot – or indeed – cover everything. So, if there’s something that you feel we’ve missed and you’d like to recommend it to other readers, feel free to let us know via the usual communication methods and we might be able to share further recommendations.

Related reading:

• The best landscape photography books for inspiration
• How to make your own photo book
• Books of the year 2023

Follow AP on Facebook, X, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok.

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Landscape has always been one of the most popular genres of photography, and it’s easy to see why. A good landscape photograph can be and encompass many things, as the books on our list demonstrate beautifully. It could be the celebration of a place or particular feature – a spectacular mountain or peaceful lake – or the evocation of a moment, like a pitch-perfect sunrise or sudden snowstorm. Rural, urban – devoid of people, or full of them. If you wish to improve your landscape photography, the world is your oyster.

A great source of inspiration to take more and better landscapes is to observe the work of others; hence this list of some of the best landscape photography books to have passed our desks in recent years. Some of these collections comprise the work of several photographers, while others are by just a single artist. It doesn’t matter really – we just love seeing great landscapes!

Broaden your horizons with the right kit: check out our guides to the best landscape cameras and best lenses for landscape photography.

Featured image: St Michael’s Mount, Cornwall, England – from The Art of Landscape Photography

Best landscape photography books

Landscape by Jeremy Walker

2020, RRP £45, Self-published, hardback, 232 pages

Regular readers will already be aware of the stunning work of landscape pro Jeremy Walker. His debut book, published in 2020, takes a look at some of the UK’s lesser-known hidden gems found hidden away from the more obvious landscape locations.

It also explores some of Britain’s history, through the ruins of once-impressive castles and abbeys. Presented here are dramatic landscapes, atmospheric weather conditions and if nothing else, a checklist of potential getaway locations for your next photography trip. Its foreword is by AP editor, Nigel Atherton.

Landscape Photographer of the Year: Collection 15

2022, RRP £35, Ilex Press, hardback, 224 pages, ISBN: 9781781578650

The annual Landscape Photographer of the Year competition is one of the highlights of the photographer’s calendar, and the 2022 crop produced some absolutely spectacular imagery. The full collection from the competition’s 15th year would make a tasteful addition to any coffee table, and is the ideal source of inspiration for anyone looking to remind themselves of the incredible landscape possibilities in the UK alone.

The competition, founded by avid landscape shooter Charlie Waite, was won that year by first-time entrant Will Davies – a reminder that you don’t have to be a seasoned shooter to make a great showing in LPOTY. You can read our full interview with previous LPOTY winner Will Davies, and see a few of the winning 2023 LPOTY entries. But really, wouldn’t you rather have them in glorious printed form, to be admired and shared from the comfort of your sofa? So we thought…

Chasing Light by Stefan Forster

2022, RRP £40, Teneues, hardback, 240 pages, ISBN: 9783961713837

For their sheer diversity of locations, pick up one of Stefan Forster’s books. Every year, the Swiss photographer spends six months travelling the world, and leading a number of workshops to the planet’s most beautiful and remote places. Much of the time he spends in Iceland, his adopted second home.

In Chasing Light, his latest volume, we can see some of Stefan’s most beautiful experiences to date, shown from a variety of impressive perspectives. This tome is a potential classic in the making and a masterclass in how straightforward landscape imagery should be done.

The Art of Landscape Photography by Mark Bauer and Ross Hoddinott

2022, RRP $21 / £13.99, Ammonite Press, softback, 192 pages, ISBN 9781781454480

If you’re keen to learn more about great landscape photography, then you’ve got not one, but two industry pros on hand here to go beyond the basics and look at the heart and soul of landscape photography – composition and aesthetic design to convey meaning and emotion. With numerous examples, as well as in-depth technical detail, this is one to really pore over to improve your skills.

Stone Age: Ancient Castles of Europe by Frédéric Chaubin

2021, RRP £42.49, Taschen, hardback, 412 pages, ISBN: 9783836585019

Castles are a classic mainstay of landscape photography. If they’re your thing too, then this book – which spans Europe and includes more than 200 buildings in 21 countries – is likely to be manna from Heaven. What’s more, the images (like the one below) were shot on film with a Linhof view camera, so they’re not quite the same as your average picture-postcard travelogue. Again, you could quite easily use this as a checklist to help you plan your next landscape expedition.

Don McCullin: The Landscape

2018, RRP $92 / £44.38, Jonathan Cape, hardback, 184 pages, ISBN: 9781787330429

While best known as a documentary photographer of some of the most harrowing conflicts of the post-war 20th century, Don McCullin is also an accomplished landscape shooter and darkroom master. In this inspiring collection he captures the dark, brooding mystery of the west country in winter, notably the Somerset Levels.

A tough Londoner by birth, McCullin’s country roots run deep – he first came to Somerset as an evacuee in the war and has lived near Bruton there for many years. There are also scenes from farther-flung locations, such as Syria and India. Wherever he shoots, McCullin’s composition is dramatic and arresting, and the darkroom toning utterly breathtaking.

Ansel Adams 400 Photographs

2007, RRP $32 /£28, Little, Brown & Company, hardback, 432 pages, ISBN: 9780316117722

No collection of landscape photography books would be complete without a mention of the original master, Ansel Adams. This book from 2007 is a comprehensive overview of the legendary photographer’s stunning work, published in a beautiful volume. With an RRP of £30 (and generally available at a cheaper price) it’s an absolute bargain, and likely, if you buy just one book from our list – this should probably be it.

Sirens by Rachael Talibart

2018, prices vary, Triplekite Publishing, hardback, 64 pages, ISBN: 9780993258992

One of the best contemporary landscape photographers working today, you would be hard-pushed to find a brand new copy of any of Rachael Talibart’s books – which is a testament to how popular they are. You should be able to find second-hand copies of Sirens, however, which showcases her critically acclaimed seascape and wave work – the monstrous waves being named after mythological beings. Beautiful and considered work, this would be a fantastic addition to any budding landscape photographer’s shelf.

Landscape Photographer of the Year: Collection 16

2021, RRP $39.23 / £20.49, Octopus Publishing Group, hardback, 224 pages, ISBN: 9781781579404

The Landscape Photographer of the Year competition has been running for a fair few iterations now, and if you’re looking for more landscape inspiration, the previous years’ collections are just as spectacular as the latest. The 2023 competition was the award’s 16th year – you can see the 2023 LPOTY winners here – and includes some absolute gems. Look out for next month’s announcements of this year’s winners and their winning shots.

The winner in 2021 was Mara Leite, whose image ‘Morning at Countryside’, taken in West Sussex, netted her a cool £10,000. If you fancy a shot at that, then picking up the collection is a great way to familiarise yourself with the kinds of images that impress Charlie Waite and the other competition judges.

Classic landscape photography books

Our recommended selection of definitive landscape books

Earth from Above by Yann Arthus-Bertrand

2017 (originally published in 1999), £58, Abrams, 440 pages, ISBN: 9781419722844

First published over 20 years ago, this gorgeous book has sold more than three million copies worldwide. Aerial images from multiple journeys across five continents and 60 countries provide a comprehensive survey of the Earth from a spectacular vantage point – and from a time before drones made it more commonplace. In the newer edition, over 100 new pictures are included, as well as essays from leading experts and environmentalists.

Land by Fay Godwin

1985, Prices vary, William Heinemann Ltd, 160 pages, ISBN: 9780434303052

Arguably one of the most essential purchases for anybody interested in British landscape photography, this beautiful collection of black & white imagery covers a good breadth of the country. The pictures are subtle and lovingly printed, and anybody who finds one second-hand is unlikely to be disappointed.

Light and the Art of Landscape Photography by Joe Cornish

2003, Amphoto, Prices vary, ISBN: 9780817441524

Joe Cornish is one of the UK’s most well-known and popular landscape photographers, and this almost 20-year-old book gives an insight into his creative genius. Featuring 150 fantastic images, alongside his valuable insights on how the picture came to be made, plus technical info and the thought processes and creative inspirations behind each image.

Cape Light: Photographs by Joel Meyerowitz

2015 (originally published 1979), Prices vary, Aperture, 112 pages, ISBN: 9781597113397

Although currently out of print, this exquisite selection of photographs is widely regarded as one of the most influential and popular photography books, particularly as it was unusual at the time for its use of colour. Whether you can get your hands on an original print, or the 2015 re-edition, you’ll find a masterful array of captivating shots.

Further reading:

• Beginners guide to Landscape Photography – Get shooting!
• Books from AP: Bookazine Improve Your Photography
• See the best landscape photographs
• Best Camera for Landscape Photography 2023
• Best photography books of 2023

Follow AP on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok.

The post The best landscape photography books for inspiration appeared first on Amateur Photographer.

Every year there are amazing books published, but here we highlight the best photography publications, with dozens of fantastic tomes to add to your shelf – or your wish list.

It’s a tricky task to go through all of the books featured in the magazine in the past to pick out a set of highlights, but the simple fact that they’ve been in the magazine means we think they’re worth your attention. Despite the difficulties it presents in terms of narrowing down the huge selection, it’s always one of my favourite things to do – and a real joy to put together the finished list of recommendations.

I’ve tried to include a broad church of different volumes in my selection. There should be something to meet most budgets and interests. We’ve got a wide selection of genres, photographers and styles here, so there should be something to suit every need.

Documentary photography, particularly historical and archive photography, has been particularly strong, with a keen sense of nostalgia seeming to do well with book publishers.

There’s also great showings from wildlife photographers, historical and archival work and contemporary artists too, showing that there’s no sign of the medium becoming less favoured even in a primarily digital age. 

There’s still something special about having something physical to hold in your hands, the smell of the paper and the weight of a solid book. Even if we do perhaps need reinforced shelving to hold some of our favourites.

The books presented here are in no particular order. Narrowing it down the selected few was difficult enough, let alone ordering them. Of course, every person’s taste is different so what might appeal to me might not appeal to you. Hopefully, there’s at least a couple here that will tickle your fancy. Happy reading!

Magnum Magnum (2023 edition) Edited by Brigitte Lardinois, Foreword by Olivia Arthur

£125, Thames & Hudson, 728 pages, hardback, ISBN: 9780500545621

A couple of members of Magnum Photos are mentioned elsewhere in this round-up, but for the ultimate of the agency’s enormous and well-regarded collection, then Magnum Magnum is the one to get.

Yes, it’s priced at £125, which is by no means cheap, but at 728 pages and more than 500 pictures, it actually scores highly on the value for money scale (and you are likely to find it cheaper than the RRP anyway).

Magnum Magnum is an epic tome covering the span of the agency’s 75 years, with images being selected by other members, a reflection of the agency’s founding principle of collaboration. It was first published in 2007, and sold a staggering 200,000 copies. This new edition adds in 25 new photographers who have joined the agency in the past 15 years. If you want to learn what does well in both historical and contemporary documentary photography, this is possibly the only book you need this year.

Sammy Davis Jr. looks out a Manhattan window. New York City, USA, 1959. © Burt Glinn / Magnum

Buy now from Amazon UK

Love Story: New Photography of Love and Intimacy

£20, Hoxton Mini Press, hardback, 224 pages, ISBN: 9781914314353

Featuring the work of more than 23 contemporary photographers, this anthology aims to capture what it is to love and be loved in the modern world.

A range of types of love are considered in this beautiful volume from the ever-wonderful Hoxton Mini Press. There’s first love, lost love, parental love, friendship love and much more besides.
To explore that love, we see a series of compelling portraits that gel together extremely well, with representations across many divides. It’s perhaps fair to assume that not every photograph will stun you visually, but pretty much every story should touch your heart in some way.

Back in my original review (AP 7 March 2023 issue), I predicted that this book would make it into AP’s 2023 Books of the Year list, and unsurprisingly, few have surpassed it in terms of all-round warmth and humanity – and it’s a great price too.

© Curtis Hughes

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Dark Room by Garry Fabian Miller

£40, Bodleian Library, hardback, 240 pages, ISBN: 9781851246090

I know many of our readers aren’t fans of Fabian Miller’s work – we have the letters to prove it – but Dark Room spoke to me in ways that very few photographic books have over the years.
The abstract photography here certainly won’t be to everybody’s tastes (as if that’s a bad thing), but to sit down and absorb the book, cover-to-cover, is quite an experience that is far more than the sum of its individual parts.

It takes the form of a memoir, charting the photographer’s career from its early days up to the present. Yes, it’s camera-less, it’s OK not to like it, but the fact that this process involves Garry spending hours sitting in complete darkness, and, may poignantly have caused his diagnosis of cancer, is a testament to an artist’s dedication to their craft.

This book accompanied one of my favourite exhibitions of the year – perhaps of the past several years – at the Arnolfini in Bristol, where the scale of the work allowed you to take it in much more than the book could ever hope to. I’d urge you to give it a try if you happen to come across this book – you never know how you might feel at the end of it.

There is No Shadow, 2017. Light, oil, Lambda C-print dye destruction print. © Garry Fabian Miller

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On Divorce: Portraits and voices of separation, a photographic project by Harry Borden

£18, The School of Life Press, hardback, 144 pages, ISBN: 9781915087393

You might not think of divorce as the obvious subject for a photography book, but with Harry Borden’s tender and touching project for The School of Life, you might be surprised to learn just how perfect it is for a photographer like him.

Anybody familiar with the magazine will already recognise Harry’s name from our regular When Harry Met magazine series, as well as from other projects that we’ve featured in the past. A successful portrait and advertising photographer for many years, his distinctive style with celebrities and other well-known figures has given him many years of experience of getting to know a story to help him with personal projects like this.

That said, the portraits here are about as far-removed from the glamour and glitz of a celebrity portrait as you can get, but, of course, are all the more real for it. A subject close to his own heart, through a compelling series of portraits we learn that divorce, although often painful, doesn’t necessarily have to be a disaster. A wise lesson for us all and certainly an intriguing prospect for a photography book.

Lucia (with Lola and Bruno) © Harry Borden

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Portrait of Humanity Volume 5

£25, Hoxton Mini Press, hardback, 320 pages, ISBN: 9781914314346

The latest volume of the fantastic Portrait of Humanity, produced in collaboration with the British Journal of Photography, brings together more than 200 portraits by photographers from across the globe.

I always find that each one of these portraits is a reflection of both the sitter and the photographer – as all good photographic portrait collaborations probably should be. Each one also comes with a small story to give you some background about who it is you’re looking at.

If you like portraiture as much as I do, then it’s always a treat to receive the latest of the Portrait of Humanity books – and don’t forget that there’s also a Portrait of Britain book too for a more inwards look at our own nation.

The small size of this book keeps it affordable for the variety of portraits you get included, but still displays them beautifully – it would make a great present (Christmas or otherwise) for other photographers in your life.

Heritage Unmoving by Ponita Keo

Kiss It! by Abbie Trayler Smith

£40, GOST Books, hardback, 112 pages, ISBN: 9781910401958

This extraordinary documentary project shows us the value of a long-term collaboration between photographer and subject. It also shows us that looking at what you know – or what you’ve experienced yourself – brings an added dimension to a project that you might not otherwise benefit from.

Kiss It! follows the life of Shannon, a young woman living with obesity who the photographer Abbie Trayler-Smith has worked with for 12 years, spanning Shannon’s teenage years to her young adulthood. It forms part of the photographer’s even longer-term project, ‘The Big O’, which looks at obesity in school-age children and young adults.

Abbie sees herself in Shannon, as she experienced the same issues herself as an adolescent. This is also a topic that is affecting huge numbers of the British population – around one in four people in the UK are thought to be affected by it, so it’s something that probably resonates with many.

Full of joy, warmth and celebration, the project encourages us to examine our own prejudices and for that reason alone, I wanted to include it in my books of the year. It’s also technically excellent, and beautifully laid out and curated too.

Shannon, age 22, on holiday. Costa del Sol, Spain, 2018. © Abbie Trayler-Smith

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The New Big 5: A Global Photography Project for Endangered Wildlife by Graeme Green

£62.50, Earth Aware Editions, 272 pages, hardback, ISBN: 9781647228705

This is another compendium of amazing wildlife photography, which also aims to shine a light on the problems that the world’s natural population is facing. Authored by regular AP contributor Graeme Green and featuring the work of 146 fantastic wildlife photographers, the book highlights the threats facing wildlife. Big names here include Steve McCurry, Paul Nicklen, David Lloyd, Art Wolfe, Beverley Joubert and more – as well as Graeme’s own work.

The original ‘Big 5’ is a term coined by colonial-era hunters in Africa for the most prized animals to shoot and kill: elephant, rhino, leopard, Cape buffalo and lion. Around ten years ago, while on assignment in Botswana, Graeme had the idea to flip this miserable term on its head and create a New Big 5 of wildlife photography – shooting with a camera rather than a gun.

To select the new big 5, Graeme put it to a public vote. Overall the winners came out as elephant, polar bear, gorilla, lion and tiger. You’ll find pictures of all of these animals – and many more – in this beautifully put together book.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Water by Ian Berry

£45, GOST Books, hardback, 180 pages, ISBN: 9781910401927

The legendary photojournalist, Magnum member, and subscriber to AP magazine, Ian Berry, published a sublime book this year – and it easily makes it into our list of best books, and not just of this year either.

Comprising 93 black & white images over 180 pages, and more than 15 years in the making, it displays all the credentials that you’d expect from someone invited to join the prestige agency by none other than Henri Cartier-Bresson himself.

He told Peter Dench earlier in the year, ‘I have gradually become aware through the years of my gathering images that something extraordinary was happening to our world – this year has shown above all others that the planet is struggling. There is too much water in some places, too little in others.’

The book, funded through a kickstarter, is a real labour of love, with maximal input from Ian Berry himself, and is not only a visual treat but an important one too.

Kolkata (Calcutta), West Bengal, India. Washing in the street is quite usual in the suburbs of a city where, a couple of miles from the centre, people have no running water in their homes © Ian Berry

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Book of the Road by Daniel Meadows

£45, Bluecoat Press, Flexibound hardcover, 220 pages, ISBN: 9781908457783

Fifty years ago, renowned British documentary photographer Daniel Meadows set off in his free photographic omnibus and captured a portrait of our nation that is still widely considered to be a masterpiece of documentary photography.

Aged just 21 at the time, Daniel travelled over 10,000 miles in a double-decker bus mapping the length and breadth of England, photographing a total of 958 people and offering a free print to each of his subjects.

The characters he encountered along the way – or at least some of them – are featured in this half-century anniversary of the famous project, which has been styled and shaped to emulate the old AA Book of the Road. A wonderful project, a wonderful read, and the perfect choice for anybody interested in the history of British documentary photography when it was perhaps at its peak.

Neil with his head in an elephant’s mouth, Circus Hoffman, Weymouth, Dorset, July 1974 © Daniel Meadows

Reclaim the Street: Street Photography’s Moment

£50, Thames and Hudson, hardback, 320 pages, ISBN: 9780500545379

Street photography is one of those genres that is hard to define precisely, but this book shows off the fantastic breadth and depth of those actually out there pounding the streets to do the work.
Curated by street photography stalwart Matt Stuart, and edited by Stuart McLaren – another big name in the field – the book attempts to put the spotlight on different facets of the genre in an engaging and well- thought-through collection.

It took Matt nearly four years of ‘almost-constant’ work to put the impressive tome together, and the love that has gone into every chapter really does shine through. As a thoroughly modern sweep of contemporary street photography, you shouldn’t expect all the classic, traditional or big names in this volume – and the book is all the better for that.

Haven’t we already digested enough of that work over the past half a century? Here we see things, names and places we might not have seen before, and for that reason, it’s easily one of the best books on street photography I’ve come across before. Equally, however, don’t worry about missing out on some of the ‘obvious’ things you might ordinarily assume to be in a book like this – there are those too. In short, there’s something for everyone here and for those looking to engage with this tricky genre, it’s hard to find something better.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Best of the rest featured in AP throughout 2023

Colourmania: Photographing the World in Autochrome by Caitlin Langford

ISBN: 9780500480762

This is a must-buy for lovers of early photography. Put together with access to the V&A’s autochromes collection, it provides a stunning look at the early 20th century in colour.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Julia Margaret Cameron: Arresting Beauty

ISBN: 9780500480861

Another delight for early-photography aficionados. Julia’s photographs broke conventions at the time, and give us a glimpse of what it was to be a strong, determined woman artist at the time too. This is a great introduction to her work if you’re not already familiar.

Buy now from Amazon UK

A Country Kind of Silence by Ian Howorth

ISBN: 9781915652034

Ian Howarth has an eye for spotting the beautiful in the mundane, and this collection of his work is a great example of how you can find subjects no matter where you point your camera. Full of small moments you might otherwise overlook.

David Hurn: Photographs 1955-2020

ISBN: 9781739702335

An opportunity for David Hurn to look back over his 65-year archive is also a fantastic treat for the reader. There are lesser-seen photographs, better-known works and a demonstration of the breadth and depth of this Magnum and documentary legend.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Evelyn Hofer: Dublin

ISBN: 9783958296329

Seen as part of her most important body of work, this book takes a look at the renowned documentary photographer Evelyn Hofer’s Dublin images. Largely consisting of portraits shot in 1965-66, the pictures within show off exactly what made Hofer a master of her craft, with an intense and respectful engagement with her subjects that few can replicate.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Shooters by Julia Boggio

ISBN: 9781739215118

I don’t think I’ve ever recommended a novel on our books pages before – and perhaps I never will again. However, for something a little bit different, how about a fiction book about the thrills and spills of being a wedding photographer? An ideal beach read, it’s also a good romp to see you through the dark winter nights, too.

Buy now from Amazon UK

California Dreamers by Sally Davies

ISBN: 9781781454657

We loved Sally’s 2021 New Yorkers project, so it was great to see a follow-up this year in the shape of California Dreamers, which looks at the characterful inhabitants of this vast state. Portraits taken in people’s homes aim to reveal as much – if not more – about their character as their physical appearances, and it works extremely well.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Breathing Space: Iranian Women Photographers by Anahita Ghabaian Etehadieh

ISBN: 9780500027158

This book highlights the work of 23 women photographers from Iran. A great look at photography from a non-Western perspective, it has been curated by the founder of the Silk Road Gallery in Tehran, Iran’s first gallery dedicated to contemporary photography.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Remembering Leopards by Wildlife Photographers United

ISBN: 9781999643379

The eighth book in the ‘Remembering’ series, this is another example of how photography can help the plight of wildlife around the world. Here we have 80 stunning colour images taken by some of the biggest names in wildlife photography today.

Buy now from Amazon UK

More great books…

Chris Killip

ISBN: 978-0500025581

thamesandhudson.com

This book represents the definitive, full-career retrospective of the life and work of Chris, one of the UK’s most important and influential post-war documentary photographers.

He is best known for his empathetic work photographing working class communities in north-east England aduring the 1970s and 1980s, against a background of shipbuilding and coal mining and the deindustrialisation of those industries. His sustained immersion into the communities he photographed remains without parallel.

Curated by long-time friends Ken Grant and Tracey Marshall-Grant and published to coincide with the first full retrospective of Killip’s life and work at the Photographers’ Gallery, London (on till 19th February) this definitive collection presents images from each of his major series alongside lesser-known works. It includes a foreword by Brett Rogers, in-depth essays by Ken Grant tracing Killip’s life and career, and texts by Gregory Halpern, Amanda Maddox and Lynsey Hanley.

If you have an interest in British documentary photography Chris Killip should be considered an essential addition to your bookshelves.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Looking Out From Within by Julia Fullerton-Batten

ISBN: 9781399908726

juliafullerton-batten.com/

Although we have probably just about had enough of looking at Covid-inspired pictures, these ones are so masterfully done that we can forgive it.

Many of us carried out lockdown projects, and for professional photographers, trapped inside or close to home with little to occupy themselves, we saw them turn their lenses to the subject surrounding the world.

For Looking Out From Within, the photographer Julia Fullerton-Batten reached out to her neighbours for a set of portraits with a twist. At first glance they might seem like candid captures, they are anything but. Each is a result of a collaboration with the sitter, with home Julia would discuss costumes, props, and poses. The only difference between these and a normal portrait is that the sitters are trapped within their own homes.

Always photographed at twilight, each picture has a slightly surreal effect. It is a good reflection of how we all felt at the time no doubt.

Penelope – Lockdown Day 51 © Julia Fullerton-Batten.

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Vivian Maier Developed: The Untold Story of the Photographer Nanny by Ann Marks

ISBN 9781982166724

simonandschuster.co.uk

Buy now from Amazon UK

Vivian Maier

ISBN 9780500025703

thamesandhudson.co.uk

There’s been a lot of interest in Vivian Maier. In the first half of the 2022, we saw a comprehensive new biography of the elusive ‘photographer nanny’, meticulously researched by Ann Marks. Later in 2022, there was also a major retrospective at the MK Gallery in Milton Keynes, accompanied by a book published by Thames & Hudson.

It’s worth picking up both books if you want a detailed look at this street photography master. However, the first gives you more detail about what Vivian was like as a person – or as best can be pieced together from those who knew her and historical records.

The story of this photographer, whose work was discovered and widely shared only after she had died, has held enduring appeal since first coming to public attention in 2009. The pages of both of these books make it easy to see why.

Despite never gaining recognition during her lifetime, Maier was both extremely prolific and razor-like in her abilities to capture a moment before moving on to the next. Her archive is said to include 140,000 images, with many thousands more which were never developed. Estimates suggest only 5% of her captures were processed during her own lifetime.

Read our interview with The untold story of Vivian Maier’s author Ann Marks.

Buy now from Amazon UK

New York, January 26, 1955 © Estate of Vivian Maier, Courtesy of Maloof Collection and Howard Greenberg Gallery, NY.

Another Country by Gerry Badger

ISBN: 9780500022177

thamesandhudson.co.uk

If you’re a lover of documentary photography, Another Country is an absolute must-buy. It spans the British output to the genre since 1945, and as such includes some of the finest talents to call these shores home.

Indeed, more than 165 photographers are found inside this weighty tome’s pages. This includes Don McCullin, Bill Brandt, Bert Hardy, Nadav Kander, Cold War Steve, Chloe Dewe Matthews, Jane Bown and more.

British photography, or rather, photographers, have come to be respected as some of the finest in the world for documentary photography. The examination of British life and its society is an ongoing and vital project for its artists and photography.

This book, as well as presenting a superb array of photography, also examines themes and observations about the genre as a whole to give us a rich understanding of how it all fits together. You’ll also likely find some hidden masterpieces too that you’ve never come across before.

I said in my introduction that I wouldn’t be able to choose a single book as a winner for Book of 2022. However, for me, as a documentary and archival fan, if pushed, Another Country is exceptional and hard to beat.

Check out Gerry Bradger’s feature delving into how his book explores how photography has shaped British identity.

Paddy Summerfield, Blackpool, 1976-77 © Paddy Summerfield.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Buy now from Amazon US

Flora Photographica: The Flower in Contemporary Photography by William A.Ewing and Danaé Panchaud

ISBN: 9780500024584

thamesandhudson.co.uk

Released some 30 years after William A Ewing’s original volume, Flora Photographica is a surprising book in many respects.

As you’d expect, yes, it’s about floral photography. What you might not realise it’s just how broadly this subject spans a number of different photographic genres. You’ll find them in landscapes, portraits, documentary, fine art and of course still life photography.

A beautifully put together book, it brings together some of the best contemporary photography from some of the world’s leading practitioners – each tied by a common theme.

Again, this is a book for those who want to delve a little deeper than just looking at nice pictures (not that that is ever a bad thing). You’ll also be treated to essays exploring the meaning behind the photography, as well as essentially a history of the medium itself.

If you’re after something a little bit different, and aren’t quite sure where to start, this book marks an excellent way into exploring the contemporary.

Tall, 2017 by William Wegman.

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Face Time: A History of the Photographic Portrait by Phillip Prodger

ISBN: 9780500544914

thamesandhudson.co.uk

If you’re interested in portrait photography, this is a fascinating book that explores the genre from a range of different viewpoints.

The author, Philip Prodger, is currently a Senior Research Scholar at the Yale Center for British Art and has previously held positions including Head of Photographs at the National Portrait Gallery. In short, this is a chap who really knows his stuff.

He describes portraits as “one of the most difficult undertakings in art”. When I interviewed him earlier this year, he was kind enough to tell me all about why that’s the case – although of course the book goes into far more detail than we could have hoped to reproduce on our pages.

If you’re looking for a book which spans the history of photography this is an excellent example. I’m confident that anybody who reads it will come away learning something new about this appealing yet tricky to master genre.

Tom Hunter, Woman Reading a Possession Order, 1997, Ilfochrome print.

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Bird (New photography of the) by Gemma Padley

ISBN: 9781910566718

hoxtonminipress.com

Written by former AP Features Editor Gemma Padley, this beautiful little book from the ever-impressive Hoxton Mini Press brings together a fantastic collection of contemporary bird photography.

We’ve got exciting practitioners here including Tim Flach, Neeta Madahar, Joel Sartore, Luke Stephenson and Julia Tatarchenko. But these are not your bog-standard birds in the garden shots. Each one brings something unusual or possibly even unique to the genre and each page is a delight to look at.

If you’re considering a more artistic approach to this common subject, this book is riddled with inspiration and beauty and – as usual with HMP – is extremely affordable.

Spreo Starling #1, 2019 © Luke Stephenson.

A World History of Women Photographers by Luce Lebart and Marie Robert

ISBN: 9780500025413

thamesandhudson.co.uk

Surely winning the prize for heaviest book of the year is this fantastic volume celebrating the many female practitioners, some well-known, some less-so, to have contributed to the medium since its invention.

It will come as no surprise to most that many excellent female photographers over the years either been ignored entirely, or possibly might have been ‘lucky’ enough to be reduced to supporting acts for their better-known spouses.

This book aims to put that right, shining a light on an array of brilliant yet perhaps unforgotten, or overlooked, work. Of course, there’s also a good selection of female trailblazers, innovators, entrepreneurs and rule breakers on these pages too.

As Tracy Calder wrote in her piece about the book for AP, ‘the overriding message of the book seems to be that women were here all along, inventing, experimenting, innovating and actively participating in the development of the medium.’ An excellent book for anyone – of any gender – to pick up and educate themselves about what they might have been missing out on.

Sigriður Zoëga, Women on the Banks of the Lake, 1915.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Apollo Remastered by Andy Saunders

ISBN: 9780241508695

apolloremastered.com

For half a century, almost every publicly available image of the moon landings was produced from lower-quality copies of the originals stored in a frozen NASA vault in Houston.

Now however, expert image restorer Andy Saunders has worked his way through 35,000 images in a painstaking fashion to bring to these images to life like never before.

You’ll see detailed shots of Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong from the first moon landing (Apollo 11) as well as the the Apollo 13 crew struggling to get their stricken transit back in one piece.

There’s much more than that besides, with images also from missions pre-dating Apollo also featured. Amazingly, this is not a book which has been driven or funded by NASA itself. The agency has an open-source policy, so anyone can access the image scans – but nobody had done so before.

If you’re a space fanatic this is a book which will be manna to you, but even if you’re not, the photography work is simply sublime.

Buzz Aldrin’s portrait of Neil Armstrong, moments after their historic moonwalk.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Buy now from Amazon US

The Book of Veles by Jonas Bendikssen

ISBN: 9781910401613

An intriguing exploration of a town in the epicentre for fake news production. Or is it? A project which fooled the photography community and is perhaps a sign of things to come.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Omar Victor Diop by Omar Victor Diop

ISBN: 978887439932

Stunning and vibrant, the studio portrait photography of Omar Victor Diop is breathtakingly brilliant. Primarily using himself as a model, this book weaves together the past and present of Black African history.

Buy now from Amazon UK

The Photograph That Changed My Life by Zelda Cheatle

ISBN: 9781739913403

Curated by AP regular Zelda Cheatle, more than 50 acclaimed photographers, musicians, filmmakers, and collectors describe their life-changing encounters with a single photograph.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Fox: Neighbour, Villain, Icon

ISBN: 9780956819635

An extensive and beautiful collection of urban foxes by night, including photos of them hunting rats, standing on garden walls, sleeping on grassy verges, or sitting at ease while London’s traffic roars by.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Modern Forms: An Expanded Subjective Atlas of 20th Century Architecture by Nicholas Grospierre

ISBN: 9783791388106

This celebrated tour of modernist architecture has been expanded to include the whole globe. A must-see for architectural photography fans.

Buy now from Amazon UK

The Mennonites by Larry Towell

ISBN: 9781910401538

A new edition of Towell’s masterful documentation of the Mennonite community near his home in Ontario, Canada. A powerful and poignant black and white project that oozes class.

Buy now from Amazon UK

The Mindful Photographer by Sophie Howarth

ISBN: 9780500545539

Offered as an antidote to the millions of images created to document every single second of every single day. Encouraging everyone to slow down and experience photography in a different way, this is a lovely book for those looking for a new approach.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Light on the Riviera: Photography of the Cote d’Azur

ISBN: 9783961713950

Far from a simple travel edition, this book brings together photography from some of the biggest names in photographic history, all drawn to the beauty of the region for different reasons.

Buy now from Amazon UK

Naturally, although we do our best to cover every photography book published, we can’t possibly hope to spot – or indeed – cover everything. So, if there’s something that you feel we’ve missed and you’d like to recommend it to other readers, feel free to let us know via the usual communication methods and we might be able to share further recommendation.

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The post Best photography books of 2023 appeared first on Amateur Photographer.

Before his death in September 2022, Roger was working on a book and accompanying exhibition. It’s this show, at Brighton Museum & Art Gallery, that I am on my way to see – and it’s here that I meet journalist Shân Lancaster, Roger’s partner and wife of nearly 40 years. They first met when they worked at The Sun and collaborated on many stories over the years. ‘Roger had always meant to do a book,’ Shân says. ‘Time was getting on and he hadn’t been well. When we got the publishing deal, the first thing he did was ask the museum if they could do an exhibition. They immediately said yes.’

The Station Under the Station by Roger Bamber

Born in Leicester in 1944, Roger had a lifelong fascination with trains and as a young boy he would go on trainspotting excursions with his father. There was a family camera but he was only allowed to use it when his dad didn’t want it. Roger was more interested in graphic design and technical drawing – an influence that can be seen across his photography – but at the age of 12 or 13, he got a paper round. ‘He often got to the newsagent early, while they were sorting the papers out,’ Shân explains. ‘He’d look through them and wonder how the pictures were taken and why they’d been chosen. He’d say to himself, “That one’s better than that one,” so in many ways was teaching himself about photography.’

Precise approach

Anyone who has ever worked with Roger on a story, or who has been photographed by him, can testify as to his exacting approach. ‘Excruciating,’ as Shân puts it. And although he was renowned for this illustrative style of photography, he in fact cut his teeth on the hard stuff when he was taken on by the Daily Mail at the age of around 20. He found himself in an environment that meant he had to get the shot, no matter what.

‘He was the youngest on the staff by miles,’ says Shân. ‘He’d come from a graphic background, taking pictures of trains and composing very carefully. But the minute his feet hit the ground on a newspaper, he realised what a rush it was to bank the picture. He loved the competitive element of it. But he was one of the few people I met who could combine having the sort of eye and the patience to construct a perfect picture with being absolutely able to drop everything and smash straight in and still get a brilliant frame. Everyone loved working with him because he was great on hard news – most people dreaded working with him on features because he was so bloody nitpicking!’

Last Tin Mine Pithead by Roger Bamber

She cites one example where he photographed sculptor Bruce Williams. Instead of simply placing him next to his laser-cut pieces of work that depicted athletes in action, Roger made him leap over the panels – again, and again, and again… The next day, when he rang Bruce to thank him, the artist was in so much pain he was unable to make it to the phone…

Bamber didn’t only put others in uncomfortable positions, however. He would do it to himself, too, if it meant capturing an image that would stay in people’s minds. There are not only his images taken from the tops of the Severn and Clifton Suspension bridges, but also one taken during an altitude attempt by microlite enthusiast Rod Jenkins. It was only after Roger had lost a 36-exposure roll of film to the wind that he realised his pilot had taken him – on this ‘lawnmower with wings’ – higher than the would-be record-breaker.

Running out of Steam by Roger Bamber

All of these images were taken after Roger moved to Brighton in 1973 (to a house overlooking the station – a trainspotter’s dream), and being in the city meant he could travel across southern England in pursuit of a story, but his new home became the focus of his photography and in 1999 the council commissioned him to produce a body of work to support Brighton and Hove’s city status bid.

‘He was given free rein to be as inventive as he liked,’ Shân recalls. ‘He came up with the idea of photographing a person born in each decade leading up to the year 2000. It started with a 90-year-old man playing bowls in Hove and ended with a newborn baby at the hospital. The images were all over the London Underground – everywhere.’ The bid was successful and the University of Brighton subsequently awarded Roger an honorary degree.

It would be easy to think that someone who shot as much film as he did, with only the most minuscule alterations between each frame, is demonstrating a lack of confidence in their vision. But for Roger, it was the reverse. There was a total conviction about the way he worked and a certainty that his response to whatever was unfolding in front of him could be translated onto a piece of film with the utmost precision. Referring to one image in the show, Shân says, ‘On the contact sheet, there’s a whole sequence of almost identical ones, but a great big circle around this one.’ When he’d captured it, he knew he’d captured it.

Street Stomp by Roger Bamber

The move to colour

Roger is, of course, known for his black & white work. And if there’s one style that crops up consistently in his work it’s the silhouette – no doubt a throwback to his grounding in graphic design and technical drawing. In many ways, he would analyse a scene not for the ‘thing’ he was photographing, but the shape it was making in the frame. And that applied whether he was shooting a piece of art or a rock star.

However, during his career, the newspaper world made the transition into colour and then digital. I ask Shân whether monochrome was where his heart lay, or whether he didn’t really mind. Her reply is unequivocal: ‘Oh, he really did mind. He was horrified when he was told he was going to have to go colour, and he thought he’d have to rethink everything. And to go digital as well was a massive jump. There were a couple of hiatus years where he was having to get used to the new technology – it was very, very difficult and he practically had a nervous breakdown. But once he’d managed to change gears, he really took to it – and, of course, he was brilliant at it.’

Shadow Skaters by Roger Bamber

It was partly thanks to the support of the many friends he had made during his career that he was able to make the transition, as Shân explains. ‘He had no side,’ she says. ‘An awful lot of Fleet Street photographers are absolutely impossible – bless them – because they are so conscious of their status and they treat local photography with great condescension, but Roger treated everyone as a friend. He made friends with all the local snappers, so they responded to him and helped. If he’d been more arrogant and “Fleet Streety”, they’d probably have said, “You sink or swim, sunshine”.’

Sadly, towards the end of his life, Roger became unwell and found it more and more painful to walk, and then had a stroke that resulted in the loss of his balance and also the sight in one eye. Lockdown was also very difficult for someone whose life revolved around interactions with others, and Shân paints a picture of a frustrated man who would sit on the doorstep to their small front garden, chatting with any neighbours who passed by. Roger died of lung cancer in Sussex County Hospital, in September 2022, at the age of 78.

Smokescreen by Roger Bamber

On my way home, my attention was again drawn to the preparations for the Brighton Festival, and how Roger would have been giddy with excitement about the photographic potential. His desire to connect with people – to interact, to learn about their passions, to be curious – runs through his 50-year body of work. And in the exhibition and book, which sadly he didn’t live to see completed, we were afforded an insight into his full and fascinating life. There’s his employment card from his paper round as a boy, and a grid of the dozens of press passes that gave him access to the stories that would become his photographs. There is colour, there is black & white, hard news, features – and, of course, his beloved Brighton, in all its sometimes grey, sometimes dazzling, always characterful glory. It’s a fitting tribute to the photographer who the late Guardian picture editor, Eamonn McCabe, who died suddenly only a month after Roger, called, ‘The picture editor’s dream.’

Roger Bamber: Out of the Ordinary is on at Brighton Museum & Art Gallery until 3 September, entry £9 (which includes an annual pass to the museum) visit brightonmuseums.org.uk. The book of the same name is published by Unicorn Publishing Group, price £40.

You can also check out more exhibitions here.

Have you read these articles:

International Portrait Photographer of the Year 2023 winners revealed

10 Reasons why every photographer should shoot weddings

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The post Out of the Ordinary: the life and work of Roger Bamber appeared first on Amateur Photographer.

The British Landscape

In his wonderful book The Lost Continent: Travels in Small-Town America, Bill Bryson describes his experience of the British landscape. ‘For months the sky had remained a depthless grey. Sometimes it rained, but mostly it was just dull, a land without shadows. It was like living inside Tupperware.’

Anyone who lives on this North Atlantic island will be familiar with the ‘depthless grey’ Bryson refers to. While we might dream of dramatic skies and colourful sunsets, most of the time we go about our daily business under a dispiriting blanket of white. As photographers, we deal with this ‘Tupperware’ effect by adding an ND grad, hoping to eke out some drama. But dramatic and bucolic views of the British countryside only tell half the story.

In reality, the British landscape has been heavily shaped by human hands for centuries: quarries pockmark hills, fences criss-cross fields and roads slice through woodland. Arts and culture writer Rosalind Jana agrees. ‘In its wilder hinterlands we might think that it remains untouched, but our fingerprints – real and imagined – are all over it.’

China Clay Pit, Rocky, Ivybridge, England, 2018. © Jethro Marshall

Jana provided the text for This Pleasant Land: New Photography of the British Landscape (published by Hoxton Mini Press). The book contains projects that form a post-millennium portrait of Britain where ‘Tupperware’ skies are not just tolerated but actively sought out. ‘This selection of fine art photography captures the beautiful, the bleak, the uncontainable and the marginal,’ says Jana.

It’s an exploration of overlooked corners, from the humble hedgerow to WWII pillboxes and shapeshifting floods. There’s an overriding sense that the landscape is in a state of flux – people come and go, boundary lines are drawn and redrawn, tides nibble away at the fringes of land. The photographers selected for the book present their own personal ‘reading’ of the landscape.

Each image is an expression of their memories, associations, interests and, at times, preferences. None of these artists are interested in the chocolate box view of the landscape. ‘Instead, they raise questions about how we inhabit it, own it, work it, protect and destroy it,’ says Jana.

Glencoul, Northern Highlands, Scotland, May 2016. © Nicholas JR White

Fingerprints of man

Each photographer has a story to tell – projects range from the autobiographical to the environmental and political. What unites them is a desire to be immersed in the landscape. To hear the cry of gulls as they descend on ploughed fields, to taste salt on the air as you approach the coast, to feel snow underfoot as you walk to a mountain bothy.

These are essential visceral experiences. Few of the views would be considered classically beautiful, but each photographer has found beauty in the scene – a shaft of light illuminating abandoned cars in a slate mine, cement cubes scattered on a beach like toy building blocks, a suburban hedge that looks like a Beefeater hat. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder after all.

One photographer who has found beauty where seemingly none exists is Paul Hart. For ten years he has been capturing the effects of large-scale agribusiness on the Fens in East Anglia. The area has always been popular with writers who, Jana argues, are attracted by the flat fields, ‘domed by an unrelenting sky’.

Walpole St Andrew, Reclaimed, England 2019. © Paul Hart

While it might seem ‘damply atmospheric’ to the likes of Graham Swift, most photographers seem less keen to embrace the tilled fields and monocultural crops here. Hart, however, is an exception. Through a triptych of projects evocatively titled Farmed, Drained and Reclaimed, Hart uses a Hasselblad loaded with black & white film to describe how farming has shaped the region. ‘Many of Hart’s images have a ghostly feel, full of misted horizons and bare trees,’ says Jana. ‘They often feature lines vanishing into the distance: electrical cables, narrow lanes, silver waterways, the hard ridges of tilled fields.’

Jethro Marshall’s work also celebrates manmade participation in the landscape. For him there’s beauty in the abstract brutalism of coastal defences and quarries. ‘His trademark monochrome imagery is sparing but unafraid of drama,’ says Jana. These sculptural structures are set against natural backdrops – a cliff stabiliser mirrors the shape of the rock face behind it, a curve of anti-tank cubes nestles into shingle.

‘Whether used as military defence or to ward against erosion, there is something powerful in this idea of protection,’ notes Jana. While shooting Rocky (Marshall’s quarry project) the photographer was often asked to leave the site – a bid to protect Marshall or something else entirely? ‘Much of this land is not as free to explore as we might hope or assume,’ concludes Jana.

Places, Seven Sisters, England, 2016. © Toby Coulson

Impact of the military

If you’ve ever come across an MOD red flag while out walking – indicating possible life-threatening activities – you may have wondered how military manoeuvres impact the British landscape. Some military sites have the potential to become reservoirs of biodiversity, but others support ‘temporary’ structures that have been left to decay. Photographer Richard Brine used a combination of satellite imagery and local hearsay to pinpoint a number of Britain’s remaining 6,000 pillboxes (there were once around 30,000).

These concrete forms were built during WWII to defend Britain, but, according to Jana, ‘Many now house sheep (or furtive teenagers looking for somewhere to smoke).’ Brine has a background in architectural photography, and this preoccupation with precision (and the use of a large-format camera) carries over into his pillbox project. These defences may be dressed in moss and ivy, but Brine’s compositions are full of clean lines and negative space.

Melanie Friend is another photographer who explores how war is embedded in the British landscape. For her 2020 book The Plain, she made repeat visits to the chalk grasslands of Salisbury Plain, ‘a preparation ground for war’ since 1897. Here Friend captured the eerie presence of rusty tanks, battered telephones and stark warning signs. Her contribution to This Pleasant Land has a similarly disquieting air. For this project she travelled around the country attending air shows, which Jana describes as, ‘the respectable face of war’.

In this context, we see war as spectacle. ‘I remember feeling very sad on one particular beach – just this sense [that] here we are watching these planes as entertainment,’ recalls Friend. ‘In other countries people are terrified by what’s in the sky: the bomber, the fighter jet, the drones.’ On the ground, alongside the photographer, we stare up at the sky tracking the dark silhouettes of planes as they perform for our entertainment.

Avro Lancaster bomber (part of a Battle of Britain memorial flight), Southport Beach, Merseyside, England, 24 July 2011. © Melanie Friend

Effects of climate change

Floods, wildfires and droughts used to feel like problems that only (directly) affected the Southern hemisphere, but climate change has brought extreme conditions closer to our door. In 2022, for example, the NFCC (National Fire Chiefs Council) estimated that there were more than 500 wildfires in England and Wales – twice as many as the previous year.

Spencer Murphy spent summer 2018 recording wildfires as they transformed the landscape into an apocalyptic vision. In his images, patches of green are rare – the earth is blackened and charred, wounded and scarred. Yet there is a strange beauty in this disturbance of nature: the smoke in the air leads to muted colours, the skeletal vegetation provides focal points. ‘There is a weird beauty in it…Not like the surface of the moon, but maybe another planet,’ says Murphy.

Max Miechowski also documents the consequences of extreme weather – in this case the effects of coastal erosion. Along the coast of Britain there are pockets of land being lost to the sea at an alarming rate. ‘Gardens disappear overnight, as landslides redraw the boundary between ground and water,’ says Jana.

Land’s End, England, 2003. © Robin Friend

Buildings cling to the land as it slips beneath them, cracks widen in roads, landslides create otherworldly scenes. ‘I felt very much on the precipice…[with] this idea of being on a particular piece of land that will not exist in the future,’ admits Miechowski. ‘Once it’s gone, it’s really gone.’ But, once again, there is beauty in this shifting, impermanent environment. Miechowski often slept in his car to catch the sunrise. His pictures have a warmth and softness that acts as both a salve and a warning of what we stand to lose.

This collection of fine art photographs offers an alternative view of the British landscape. A place where people picnic by the side of the road, quaff beers in pillboxes, and plough, drain and slice the land to suit their own (temporary) needs. But that doesn’t mean it’s a bleak landscape. If you adopt the right mindset there is genuine beauty to be found in every puddle, hedge, house and ditch.

Imber Village Open Day, Merrie Albion, Wiltshire, England, 3 August 2013. © Simon Roberts

5 Tips for alternative landscape photography

Experiment with mono

Paul Hart and Jethro Marshall documented our human impact on the landscape in black & white to emphasise form and texture. Their work has a sparing quality about it, which really draws attention to every line and element in the composition.

© Paul Hart

Put some legwork in

For his project Black Dots, Nicholas JR White walked to remote mountain bothies – always feeling the ground beneath his feet. On one occasion he hiked for six hours through the Cairngorms, before camping out for three days to get his picture.

© Nicholas JR White

Look to the skies

Sometimes the land can only be truly understood when it’s set against the sky, and photographer Melanie Friend takes this to extremes. In her pictures of air shows our feet are firmly planted on the ground, but our attention is in the clouds.

© Melanie Friend

Show the people

Most of the photographers in This Pleasant Land focus on the imprint we make on the landscape, but few pictures contain people. Alex Ingram, by contrast, captures portraits of island wardens as they go about their work.

© Alex Ingram

Seek inspiration outside of photography

Harry Cory Wright’s images have the formalism of classical paintings. Wright uses a 10x8in camera and the cost of film is one factor that makes him slow down and appreciate each step of the process.

© Harry Cory Wright

Alternative landscape photography: how to see landscapes in a new light

Rise early

Max Miechowski slept in his car to catch the sunrise, Simon Roberts travelled around in a camper van, Nicholas JR White camped out in the cold. Put the effort in and you will be rewarded.

Talk to the locals

For his pillbox series, Richard Brine asked locals for their advice and combined this with satellite data to pinpoint the exact location of the defences he wanted to photograph.

Embrace serendipity

Sometimes it’s good to introduce an element of chance. Toby Trueman, for example, captures beautiful long-exposure seascapes. But instead of tracking the tides he just turns up to see what the shore reveals.

Stay curious

As children, we have a desire to see what’s around the corner, but in adulthood this seems to diminish. Ian Potter, however, encourages an appreciation of overlooked patches and a natural curiosity to see what’s around the bend.

Remain grounded

If you’re faced with an expanse of flat and empty land, much like Paul Hart was in the Fens, look for elements that will ground the space – trees, pylons or the ‘line’ of a furrow in a field.

Near Strathpeffer, Ross-shire, Scotland, January 2017. © Iain Sarjeant

Ignore obvious beauty

The colourful Americana of amusement parks, piers and fairgrounds can be alluring, but try to look beyond the surface. Rob Ball, for example, looks for evidence of weathering and decay in seaside attractions.

Keep close to home

After the restrictions of the past few years, many of us are keen to travel long distances for our photography fix. However, photographers like Iain Sarjeant are keen to prove that there are adventures right on our doorstep.

Stay in the margins

Joseph Wright, Paul Hart and Ian Potter are all fine examples of photographers who have found great riches in the hedgerows, ditches and hinterlands of Britain. Explore marginal places for maximum gain.

Shift your perspective for an alternative view of the landscape

Simon Roberts makes work that understands the landscape as an active process. To gain greater control over the narrative he often stands on his camper van roof to shoot.

Don’t fear change

Landscapes undergoing transformation make great subjects. Think Max Miechowski and his coastal erosion project. Spencer Murphy and his wildfire series and Joseph Wright’s images of flooded woodland.

This Pleasant Land: New Photography of the British Landscape, with text by Rosalind Jana, is published by Hoxton Mini Press.

Also available here.

Feeling inspired? View our landscape photography tips and get shooting some spectacular shots!

Similarly, if you are new to landscapes, check out our beginners guide to Landscape Photography.

Improve your landscape photography

Put your landscape photography to the test. Learn more alternative landscape skills on one of our upcoming landscape photography vacations. Including Isle of Skye with Jeremy Walker, Faroe Islands with Serkan Günes and Lofoten Winter Magic with Serkan Günes & Florian Warnecke. See all upcoming landscape photography holidays here.

More reading:

The best landscape photography books for inspiration

The top 20 best landscape photographs

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The post Alternative landscape photography tips – see in a new light appeared first on Amateur Photographer.

A compelling and comprehensive guide to the photographic portrait, Face Time is a new book by Philip Prodger. In it, he expertly walks us through a history of the portrait photography genre. From photography’s invention right up to the present day. He does this with care, consideration and a decent dash of humour to boot.

Currently a Senior Research Scholar at the Yale Center for British Art, his varied career as a curator in a number of prestigious institutions perfectly places him to write the book. Maybe none more so than his stint as Head of Photographs at the National Portrait Gallery in London.
Earlier this month, I was able to put my questions about a genre which is described by Philip as ‘one of the most difficult undertakings in art’ to him. Pleasingly, he responded to them with the same warmth, wit and care that is is displayed in abundance throughout his book.

Kensuke Koike and Thomas Sauvin, ‘Untitled #21 from the series No More, No Less’, 2016-2017. Image credit: Kensuke Koike and Thomas Sauvin

History of Portrait photography – what is a portrait?

The most obvious question to start with for somebody like Philip is to lay the groundwork and decide exactly what is a ‘portrait’. Aside from a straightforward definition as a picture of a person – the answer may not be as simple as you might expect. Philip says, ‘I think if you asked different curators you would get different answers to this question. But, for me, the difference is capturing something of a person’s identity – not just the way they look, not just the physicality of their features, but actually something of their personality, who they are and how they’re different from other people.’

At AP, we admittedly have a tendency to draw quite hard divisions between the photographic genres. In our portrait premium issues of the magazine we focus on portrait photography; with other similar or overlapping genres, like street and documentary, perhaps not traditionally falling into the same category and usually meriting a special of their own. As an academic and interrogator of contemporary practice however, Philip has a different opinion.

Floyd Rankins, Theopholus Bracket, Old Swampscott Fisherman, n.d., gelatin silver print. Image courtesy of the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA.

‘Frankly, in this century, there are no longer any bright lines between these different divisions – and I think that’s all for the best. I’m not sure that social documentary, or street photography, is a very satisfactory term on its own – but there’s no question that there are many portraitists who are working out in the world, in the communities, out on the street and they’re photographing people and showing us something about their story.’

How to make a great portrait photograph

Probably as anyone who undertakes the genre will tell you, portraiture is not easy. That’s not to say there isn’t skill in other genres, but it’s a simple fact that pointing your camera at a beautiful landscape, odds are you’re going to get a decent shot. The same can’t be said for pointing your lens at a person. With so many variables at play, it’s no wonder Philip describes it in the book as so tricky to master.

He explains, ‘I think that a great portrait is like a dance. You have the volition of the photographer, and the will and personality of the sitter. It’s about finding and negotiating that space. That’s an incredibly difficult thing. You’ve a kind of push and pull that’s going back and forth between the photographer and sitter, and finding that moment where you capture something unique and special is very difficult indeed.

Arthur Tress, Child Buried in Sand, Coney Island, 1968, gelatin silver print. © 2018 Arthur Tress Legacy Trust

‘I would also add that we ask an awful lot from portraits. We want our portraits to tell us something fundamental about the sitter, but we’re confining ourselves to whatever the exposure time is of that photograph – perhaps 1/60th of a second. The idea that you could condense everything that’s worth knowing about a person at that moment into 1/60th of a second is just absolutely extraordinary. A photographic portrait is uniquely powerful in that somehow that tension, where you have to condense everything down to a millisecond, makes it resolve somehow. When the photograph falls into place, it’s like no other form of communication.’

The sad news for readers of AP looking to recreate some of the great masters of portraiture is that defining how to achieve all of the above is nigh-on impossible. ‘I’m not sure I could put it into words,’ confirms Philip. ‘It’s one of those things, when you see the photograph and you’re moved, and you know you’ve seen a great photograph – but there’s no formula. There’s so many different ways of making a portrait. It can be done in the studio, it can be done in the street, it can be done with careful planning, it can be spontaneous. There’s no single recipe that will you get you to a great portrait photograph.’

Weronika Gesicka, Untitled #32, 2016 from the Traces series, 2015-2017. Courtesy Weronika Gęsicka and JEDNOSTKA Gallery

History of portrait photography vs today’s culture

There’s an interesting section in Face Time which discusses both the male gaze and the colonial gaze. These oft-controversial topics split opinions frequently – some will roll their eyes at a so-called ‘woke agenda’, while others will ferociously argue for our awareness of the issues. It’s safe to say that Philip lands somewhere near the latter. ‘We just need to be aware of the practices of the past,’ he explains. ‘I’m really struck that even when I was a younger curator, the things that male photographers thought were okay, they no longer think is okay – and you know what, the world is better for it.

We need to be absolutely careful that we’re not excluding anyone, and that we are embracing the fullness of human experience and treating people as equal. That’s actually what I think is so fabulous about portrait photography – we are all equal before the lens. Photography can be such a powerful tool to be welcoming and inclusive, to include all kinds of different perspectives.

So much ink has been spilled over the male and colonial gaze – and you know, much of it is absolutely right. But as a photographer, the question going forward must be how are we going to improve our practices and make our photography that much more interesting, compelling and inclusive.’

Zanele Muholi, Ntozakhe II, Parktown, 2016. Courtesy of Stevenson, Amsterdam/Cape Town/Johannesburg and Yancy Richardson, New York/© Zanele Muholi

Portrait photography and the Taylor Wessing prize

Moving on to another sometimes controversial topic – the Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize, organised by the National Portrait Gallery. This annual, prestigious portrait prize has been the leading international portrait competition for almost two decades. As the NPG’s former head, Philip was heavily involved in it, and is no stranger to the criticism oft-levied at the awards. Namely that all of the subjects tend to look depressed, miserable or at the least, far too serious.

Indeed, AP has published opinion pieces and received numerous letters from readers decrying the lack of smiles at the annual awards. In Face Time, Philip references neutral expressions tending to be taken more seriously, so it seems that the two are intrinsically linked. He laughs, perhaps somewhat knowingly, at my suggestion that this neutrality is mistaken for misery.

Paul Outerbridge, Portrait of a Woman, 1930s. © 2019 Graham Howe (for Paul Outerbridge)

‘You know, I would turn it around. I’d say that there are all different emotional expressions that are really powerful and alive – and it’s not that neutral expressions are not, but there’s a sort of convention in photography that people will have those neutral expressions. It dates back to the 19th century, where a smile wasn’t possible due to slow exposure times.

‘But I’d also say that it’s really hard – in some ways it’s harder – to make a photograph that is compelling of a smiling person or a laughing person. I love them, and when I was involved with Taylor Wessing, we were always looking for photographs like that for that reason, because it does become sort of a convention. But, as I say in the book, there is this idea that if you’re sitting for a formal portrait, you want to be sort of all potentialities.

You don’t want to choose your ground. You can be happy, you can be sad, you can be angry – all of these things exist as potential within you, so you might just show the neutral and then you haven’t committed to any particular emotion. But… as you say, sometimes that can look a little bit grim.

‘I’m totally sympathetic to the suggestion, but at the same time, if one went back and looked at the actual successful portraits every year, I think you’d see a certain percentage of them are very emotional, and we were not at all interested in creating something that was a sort of study in misery.’ So there we have it.

Tania Franco Klein, Plane (self-portrait) from Proceed to the Route, 2018. Image credit: Tania Franco Klein

Emotion in portrait photography

Emotion is unquestionably an integral part of portrait photography. Prodger’s doctoral thesis, studied at Cambridge University, explored the role of photography in Charles Darwin’s study of emotions. A century and a half later, I’m interested to know where we get the ‘most real’ portraits – are studio portraits somehow less real, when the environment is stripped away? Maybe the opposite is true, and without the distraction of a background, we can truly see into the human psyche. Perhaps wishing to avoid committing too fully, Philip offers ‘it depends on the sitter’ as an answer.

‘Some people are very self-conscious. And the other side of that is that some photographers are very good at making the sitter feel comfortable and confident. That’s one of the reasons that professional portrait photographers do so well, is because they have a way of engaging with the sitter.

At the same time, part of being a celebrity – if we’re talking about people who get photographed all the time – is learning to deal with the studio and be okay with it. Some people, such as me for example, I’m horrible in the studio. It would be much better to catch me out in the world doing my thing. The studio is a very unnatural situation, and I think results from it are almost miraculous, or magical really.’

Sarah Jones, The Dining Room (Francis Place) I, 1997, Colour coupler print. Courtesy Maureen Paley, London, © Sarah Jones

Portrait photography: editing

Yet another controversial topic in portraiture is the subject of editing. There seems to be something inherently more moralistic about using image manipulation when it comes to photographs of people, compared to say a landscape, or a macro subject. It’s also true of course to say that manipulation is nothing new – for any subject. In the book for instance, Philip references From Charwoman to Dowager by Cecil Beaton – a set of three images from the 1930s which show just how fundamentally a photograph could be transformed using common darkroom techniques.

The woman in the picture has been slimmed down, her hairline lowered and thinned, her double chin removed. Sounds familiar in modern times, doesn’t it? Given our earlier discussion about what exactly is a portrait, I ponder whether when something – or someone – has been changed beyond all recognition, whether it can still bear the name portrait at all. Philip says it can – but once again it depends. ‘My personal opinion is that it depends on the photograph.

Tom Hunter, Woman Reading a Possession Order, 1997, Ilfochrome print. Ilfochrome print. Photo Tom Hunter

You said “beyond all recognition”, but that’s a very loaded term. Portraits can be very abstract – they don’t necessarily have to look like the physiognomy of the person being photographed. I’m not of the school that it ceases to be a portrait if you can no longer automatically easily recognise the figure. I think it depends on the intent of the artists and how successful they’ve been in presenting that essence of the individual. There’s an idea in art that representation doesn’t necessarily have to mean figurative exactness, that in fact, representation can mean some of those qualities about a person that a picture can elicit and they don’t have to be strictly representational.’

Final thoughts

Face Time is a book that’s been in the works for quite a while. It’s not just the often relatively slow pace of book publishing we’re talking about here, but says Philip, it stretches back even further. ‘It goes back to my earliest days as a curator and a scholar,’ he explains. ‘There’s bits in there that go back to my doctoral thesis. In fact it was great fun to put the book together, as I was able to draw along every stop of the way of my career. I pulled out photographs from every institution I’ve worked out. Of course the viewer doesn’t have to know that – it’s not particularly interesting for them – but for me it was a great privilege.

Münchner Stadtmuseum Josef Albert, Hedgehog and Hare, from the Fairy Tale Ball, 1862. Image credit: Münchner Stadtmuseum

‘The actual book started before Covid. It took several years to pull it together, and is one of those projects that would probably have been done sooner were it not for the pandemic. That said, this period of time that we’ve just been through – with the shutting down of certain kinds of social interactions and intensifying of others; it’s really poignant. I think it’s a really good book to read in the wake of Covid (let’s hope it’s the wake) – it really brings home a lot of these issues around social interaction – and portrait photography is nothing but social interaction.’

Philip perhaps sums it up best in the book itself: ‘Ultimately, all portrait photography is social. Like all art, portraiture has many different and sometimes overlapping purposes. Arguably the most notable, powerful and enduring is also the simplest. It heals, comforts and strengthens – by reminding us we’re not alone.’

I can’t resist one last question before our enlightening conversation ends. The name of the book: is it a play on the Apple software, that among others, exploded in popularity over the past couple of years – or not? ‘No – it was not a play on the Apple product at all,’ Philip answers. ‘It was just an attempt to get out this question of faces, and 95% of all portraits zero in on the face – something which I discuss in the book.

The idea that the photographer is looking at the face, and then the face is looking at the photographer. Then, the image is displayed in print or on a screen, so the viewer is looking at the face. It’s a whole chain reaction of faces – and interpretation and expression… so we thought that was a good title.’

© Thames & Hudson

Face Time: A History of the Photographic Portrait by Philip Prodger is available to buy now. Published by Thames and Hudson, RRP £30. ISBN: 9780500544914

Also available here.

Further reading

The best photographs of 2022

Best photography books of 2022

Best women photographers: an alternative history of photography

Beginners guide to Portrait photography

Best cameras for portraits and portrait photography 2023

Follow AP on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube.

The post Face Time: history of portrait photography book reviewed appeared first on Amateur Photographer.

In 1939, Anita Conti (the first female French oceanographer) set sail on the cod-fishing boat Viking for a three-month voyage that would see her tossed around the North Atlantic. While trying to take notes and photographs of life in and on the ocean. Dressed in a sailor’s smock and white gloves, she clambered among the masts and ropes, recording the hardships of life at sea. From the loneliness to the physical challenges presented by storms and fierce winds.

During World War II, Conti headed out with the minesweepers, producing images that were eventually published in L’lIlustration, a weekly French newspaper. Before heading towards Africa, studying fauna and fishing techniques along the way. The challenges of shooting at sea were manifold. ‘Some films were developed in muddy and brackish waters; others dried too slowly in the damp shade of mosquito-filled huts,’ she recalls. ‘And I haven’t counted the number of shipwrecks with the cameras and their load of film.’

Conti was a remarkable woman. For more than 50 years she reported on the negative effects of industrial fishing, while still empathising with the very people contributing to the issue. And yet, shamefully, until I was handed a copy of A World History of Women Photographers – I had never heard of her.

Anna Atkins, Alaria esculenta, from Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype
Impressions, 1849-50. © The New York Public Library

Alternative history

Setting out to produce an alternative world history of photography is always going to be challenging. As soon as you are holding the finished article in your hand, the naysayers will pipe up and complain about who you have omitted or included. It’s all par for the course. However, it’s clear that historians Luce Lebart and Marie Robert – the powerhouses behind this project – have gone to extraordinary lengths to ensure this ‘re-reading’ is as comprehensive as possible. ‘This “world tour” enables us to re-evaluate some women who were celebrated and acknowledged in their time. To remember others now unjustly forgotten, and to discover others whose work was never exhibited or discussed during their lifetime,’ they say.

To help them make their final selection (comprising 300 women photographers), they called upon a network of experts and enthusiasts. Many of whom introduced them to artists in countries or continents where a lack of research, publications or exhibitions ultimately prevented them from showcasing or sharing their work. Continuing in this vein, the book features text from more than 160 female historians, critics, archivists, curators, photographers and writers. Thankfully, it is edited in such a way that there remains a central, sympathetic voice.

Nil Yalter, Turkish Immigrants, 10th Paris Biennial, 1977. © Courtesy the artist and Galerist, Istanbul

Being overlooked

Most people won’t read the book from beginning to end, as I did. But doing so allowed me to spot recurring themes and navigate my own path through this weighty tome. One of the key things that struck me was just how many excellent female photographers have been reduced to supporting acts or ignored entirely in favour of their spouses over the years. When Amélie Guillot-Saguez displayed her calotypes at a major exhibition in 1849, for example, the spokesman for the jury – who awarded the work a bronze medal – actually confused her with her husband!

Likewise, Constance Talbot (the wife of William Henry Fox) is known to have assisted her husband with many of his experiments in the negative/positive process. Yet is barely mentioned in the history books. ‘Many of these women remained throughout their lives in the shadow of a “master”, at the cost of seeing their own contribution erased from memory,’ echoes Robert.

Sandra Eleta, Putulungo and Alma, Portobelo couple, 1977. © Sandra Eleta. Courtesy Galerie Rouge, Paris

It would be nice to believe this behaviour belongs in the past, but German photographer Hilla Becher was experiencing the pain of being overlooked as recently as the 1960s. In fact, the first exhibition of Hilla and Bernd Becher’s photographs (held at the Ruth Nohl Gallery in Siegen) was titled Bernhard Becher: Fotos. To add insult to injury, in 1976, the Kunstakademie in Düsseldorf offered Bernd a professorship. Hilla led sessions for the students both at home and in the lab, without ever being offered an official role at the art school.

Celebrating rulebreakers

It would be easy to fixate on the instances where women have been sidelined or assigned to the roles of muse, model or domestic support. But A World History of Women Photographers is so full of fabulous trailblazers, entrepreneurs and rulebreakers that there’s always something to prevent you from feeling dispirited. Alexandrine Tinne, for example, was a gutsy Dutch aristocrat whose passion for travel led her to take huge risks. ‘In Egypt, several boats had to be chartered to carry the clothes, bedlinen, supplies, items for barter, dinner services, weapons, and even a cast-iron bed,’ reveals curator Mattie Boom.

Nair Benedicto, Kissing at a Mario Zan concert, São Paulo, 1978. © Nair Benedicto/N Imagens

Photography played a secondary role in Tinne’s life (she was mainly devoted to botany and ethnography). In the decade before she was murdered in the Libyan desert at the age of just 33, she produced 20 or so large-format views of The Hague. As well as a number of interior and portrait pictures that show what might have been.

Then there’s Dickey Chapelle. The American photojournalist described by art critic and editor Diana C Stoll as, ‘A wiry woman in cat-eye glasses, often sporting military fatigues, an Australian bush hat and pearl earrings, with a Leica in her hand and a wry smile on her lips.’ Chapelle wasn’t afraid to put herself in the centre of the action. She fearlessly reported from the battle zones of World War II. As well as on the ground in Vietnam, where she was eventually killed by a booby-trap explosive in 1965.

Zanele Muholi, Bona III, ISGM, Boston, from the series ‘Somnyama Ngonyama’, 2019. © Zanele Muholi. Courtesy Stevenson, Cape Town/Johannesburg and Yancey Richardson, New York

Paving the way

Of course, there are also the pioneers. Women who played significant roles in developing new photographic techniques, styles and genres. I particularly enjoyed the entry on French photographer Lady Frances Jocelyn. In 1841, Jocelyn was appointed Lady of the Bedchamber to Queen Victoria.

The monarch was a keen collector and patron of photography. With a special passion for cartes-de-visite images, which she arranged in albums with her husband, Albert. It’s no surprise, then, to find Jocelyn using commercially produced cartes-de-visite cards in her work. But what makes it really stand out is the fact she combines them with her own watercolour paintings. In one piece, an image of Jocelyn’s face is positioned at the centre of an archery target. Her photocollages feel modern, despite the fact they were created more than a century ago.

Fast forward a few decades and British photographer Hannah Maynard was being equally playful with composites. At one point she managed to bring together 22,000 faces on the same sheet! (In later years her skills were recognised by the Victorian police department who employed her to produce mugshots.) Naturally, A World History of Women Photographers also features artists who have influenced the generations that followed them. Diane Arbus, for example, revolutionised the way we think about portraiture. While Claude Cahun’s exploration of appearance and identity impacted the work of Cindy Sherman and ORLAN.

Isabel Muñoz, Untitled, from the series ‘Bam’, 2005. © Isabel Muñoz

Courting controversy

No comprehensive guide to the history of photography can ignore the fact that some key figures courted controversy. German photographer Leni Riefenstahl, for example, produced some of the most effective examples of Nazi propaganda in existence. Something she continued to be proud of until the end. ‘Leni Riefenstahl embodies the anti-heroine par excellence. The incarnation of the artist ready to embrace all forms of transgression in order to achieve recognition,’ suggests lecturer Anaïs Feyeux.

Meanwhile, Danish photographer Mary Willumsen made a good living out of illegally selling erotic photographs of women in the form of postcards between 1914 and 1921. ‘She started producing staged nude portraits in the women’s section of the “Helgoland” outdoor public bathhouse outside Copenhagen,’ explains professor of photography Mette Sandbye. ‘The photographs were mass-printed by various postcard publishers, and sometimes sold as illustrations to magazines such as Vore Damer (Our Ladies).’

Pamela Singh, Tantric Self-Portrait in Jaipur #18, c. 2000–1. © Pamela Singh. Courtesy the artist and sepiaEYE, New York

The story of Bunny Yeager (who is sometimes credited as being the inventor of the bikini) is also worth mentioning. Yeager started her career as a pin-up girl and beauty queen. But went on to learn the craft of photography and create her own staged self-portraits. ‘In an era when women appeared as objects of desire crafted by and for men, Yeager’s work in this arena is a notable anomaly,’ says educator and art curator Sara Knelman. Yeager produced a series of successful ‘how-to’ photography books, most notably How I Photograph Myself (published in 1964).

The overriding message of A World History of Women Photographers seems to be that women were here all along. Inventing, experimenting, innovating and actively participating in the development of the medium. They were not just wives, objects of the male gaze, mothers or models. From sailors to war correspondents and adventurers, these women have battled to record and share their passions and stories.

Victoria Ivleva, Dosimetrist Yuri Kobsar climbs radioactive debris inside the fourth reactor at Chernobyl nuclear power plant, 1991. © Victoria Ivleva

‘These women were everywhere and recorded everything,’ agrees Robert. And yet, until recently, many of them were invisible – as far as historical accounts were concerned. Thanks to the team behind this epic book. A World History of Women Photographers is sure to play a significant role in creating a richer, more accurate and balanced narrative.

A World History of Women Photographers, edited by Luce Lebart and Marie Robert (ISBN 978-0-500-02541-3), is published by Thames & Hudson, price £60

Also available here.

Further reading

The best photographs of 2022

Best photography books of 2022

The best contemporary British photographers

12 top UK woman photographers you must follow

Follow AP on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube.

The post Best women photographers: an alternative history of photography appeared first on Amateur Photographer.

As regular readers will know, Brian May is a passionate evangelist for stereoscopic photography, and has been since Queen broke through in the 1970s.

Forget chucking tellies out of hotel windows. He happily recalls, ‘I did a mixture of things when we were on the road, but one of the things I generally did when getting off a plane in a new city was to go and find the local sources of stereoscopic material. It sounds very geeky but it kept me happy!’

Stereoscopy is Good For You: Life in 3D is the latest book from Brian’s London Stereoscopic Company (LSC). It is a collection of ‘stereo’ pictures taken by people all over the world throughout the pandemic. There are some fantastic images in the book as you can see here (they are best viewed with Brian’s Owl viewer, available here).

One vision

First of all, we wondered if Brian was surprised by the huge response when LSC first put out the call on social media for images taken during the lockdowns.

‘To be honest, yes, I didn’t realise how far the message had got. As I say in the introduction to the book, this is a kind of evangelical effort. I still believe we can properly put stereoscopy on the map.

I thought it was great fun seeing what people did when they were in lockdown. Then it clicked, gradually, that what we were doing was gathering together inspiration for other people. Stereoscopic pictures are so much more evocative than “normal” ones and this book became a fantastic opportunity to show this off.’

Brian is also keen to stress that every photographer featured in the new book is an amateur photographer.

From Stereoscopy is Good For You: Life in 3D. Taken by: Tom Robinson.

‘The majority of LSC’s books have been historical,’ he says, ‘but this book is about photography for the common person, just as AP has set out its own agenda over the years. These are all amateurs who took part. They take stereoscopic pictures because they get a thrill, or a feeling of comfort or connection, or want to capture something that will evoke very strong emotions when they look at it later in life.’

It’s a hard life

In the introduction to the book, Brian notes how fascinating it was to see how so many of the photographers sent an apology for the quality of their work alongside their entry. Did Brian suffer from a similar insecurity with his adventures in stereoscopic photography?

‘That’s an easy question to answer. I get insecure about everything, including my music! I think all artists do. But the older I get the more I think that is an essential part of being an artist, they need this questioning and insecurity to keep updated their view on the world and how they fit into it.’

Stereoscopy is Good For You: Life in 3D. Taken by: Steven C.

Stereoscopy is Good for You comes in at nearly 200 pages and features hundreds of photographers. Yet it was a relatively small team of people at LSC that put it together, including Brian.

‘The whole of the LSC is only about six people, and five of us were involved in the book,’ he explains, ‘so it wasn’t a big team but it was a very hard-working one.

You feel a great responsibility when it comes to choosing the images. I don’t like being judgemental, and we just wanted to distil the best of everybody’s work. As it turned out, most of the people who submitted work are represented in some way, but of course some people put in irresistible work, so were featured more than once.’

‘Unlike our previous books,’ he continues, ‘these images came in with every conceivable kind of alignment, framing etc, so it was an enormous job editing each one to get it to the optimum point. The most important consideration was to avoid giving the reader a headache. You need to keep a firm watch on the convergence of the images and now they are aligned to avoid straining the readers’ eyes.

I worked with my “great accomplice” Denis Pellerin, spending hours and hours editing the images into a format which would be both beautiful and comfortable to look at.’

There is a wide choice of subjects in the book. However the images also reflect the limitations on people’s movement during the global lockdowns.

‘I was surprised by how much people got involved in the small things around them,’ Brian notes. ‘Some of the insect images are stunning, and it got me thinking that if it hadn’t been for the lockdowns, some of us wouldn’t have had the time to go into our gardens and explore. Perhaps the most enduring images are of pets – people got particularly close to their pets during lockdown and you really feel that bond.’

Stereoscopy is Good For You: Life in 3D. Taken by: Andrew Lauren.

Days of their lives

So which images are his personal favourites? ‘It’s hard to choose, but I love the coach and horses (see above). It’s breathtakingly beautiful when you look at it through the Owl viewer. You feel this rush of cold air, hear the crunch of the snow, sense the horses… We did consider it as a cover for the book, but went with the monarch butterfly, which we also love.’

As well as many images from Europe, Stereoscopy is Good for You features work from farther-flung places. ‘Stereoscopy seems to be popular in Japan, certainly in my sphere of influence, and there are some great photographers with whom I communicate with directly.

One in particular, Masuji Suto, has produced the wonderful i3D Steroid app (see below) as well as being a great photographer. South America delivered a lot of images for the book too, and there were lots from the US and Canada.

From Stereoscopy is Good For You: Life in 3D. Taken by: Masuji Suto.

‘A couple of images came from Russia too,’ Brian reveals, ‘and we debated whether to include them. In fact, the book had already gone to press by the time of the Ukraine invasion, but we wondered if we should have taken them out. But I thought, hey, these are images made by common people like us, and they have no influence on their government.

It’s the same with music. With Queen, we have always tried to play to the people and disregard the political situation. Music is about connecting people, and that’s our job, and it’s the same with photography. That said, none of us wants to put any kind of approval on what Russia is doing as a country right now. It’s an incredibly painful situation.’

A real eye-opener

Returning to image making, Brian strongly believes that exploring stereo photography can benefit more conventional photographers, too. ‘This may sound corny, but taking stereo pictures does open your eyes. You see in a different way, as you need to imagine that you can see depth as well as everything else.

I now have an indelible disposition to look at scenes and see them “properly” in stereo. A lot of people go through almost their whole lives without realising they have this wonderful depth of perception. My job as the stereoscopic evangelist is to go, “No, there is a way you can transform your pictures into a format that will enable you to enjoy them forever as you did at the time of capture.”’

Does Brian think that some would-be exponents are put off by the time involved in stereoscopic photography? Or have apps made it much easier?

‘Yes to both,’ he says, ‘but the gap is closing. I can take stereo pictures so quickly now on my iPhone, which is something we talk about in the book. When I show the results, particularly to young people, they are gobsmacked and go around taking pictures of their friends all the time. So yes, it can be instant and can be so penetrating to take a stereo photo of your loved ones. In ten years you will think wow, it’s like I can see them or touch them.’

From Stereoscopy is Good For You: Life in 3D. Taken by: Conny Wetzig,

Brian then talks about his love for analogue photography. He first got the bug when developing and printing images with his father in the family darkroom. He has also memorable stereo images on analogue gear.

‘I have a wonderful antique stereo camera called a Rolleidoscop and the images I took of my kids when they were younger are beyond belief. You get such a strong sense of reality. There is still a magic about analogue and it’s the same in music… analogue has a different quality that you can’t quite get in digital.’

Brian is now 75, but shows little sign of slowing down. He continues to tour with Queen, as well as doing solo work and, of course, is a committed stereoscopy evangelist. So does he personally find stereoscopy is good for him?

‘Yes, it’s a much-needed stress reliever. I always take the equipment on tour with me and I edited a lot of the images for this book while on our last European tour. It’s a great escape, and less stressful than music performance, though I love both.’

From Stereoscopy is Good For You: Life in 3D. Taken by: Pascal Martiné.

We need it on phones

As mentioned at the start of this interview, Brian developed his own viewer for stereoscopy called the Owl. While it works well, he finds it frustrating that phone makers are not building a similar functionality into their phones.

‘I did a design to turn an iPhone into a stereo camera instantly,’ he reveals, ‘but nobody took me up on it. Yes, we now have the crowdfunded Qoocam, which is a nice stereo stills and movie camera, but it would be nice to have something built into phones.

We all carry them around with us. If phone makers can put three cameras on here (he holds up his iPhone) it would be dead easy for them to put lenses one across the other.’

If the book is a success, Brian is open to the idea of a follow-up, albeit with some caveats. ‘This was toughest book we have done. I have thought of some ways to make the process smoother but at the end of the day, you still have to sit and edit everything to the accuracy of a pixel. I hate seeing inaccuracies in stereo photography books, where some of the pictures are the wrong way round or give you headaches. I had to obsessively check for errors during numerous proofs; it really matters a lot to me.’

Brian May’s favourite app

‘I only use one, i3D Steroid for the iPhone (for Android phones, it’s called 3D Steroid). This is a very nice app and is very cheap, considering the developer, Masuji Suto, updates it for free. Suto-san is always open to suggestions too, a proper genius, and his pictures are also featured in Stereoscopy is Good for You.’ See the app store for your phone: i3DSteroid on the App Store/3DSteroid on Google Play.

Major new exhibition

Brian is steeped in the history of stereoscopic photography. We wondered, if push came to shove, who is his favourite exponent?

‘Ah, that’s easy – TR Williams, who was a master of his craft during the first stereoscopy boom in the 1850s. He had an exquisite eye for detail and composition, and pioneered his own chemical technique and ways of making the viewing cards. TR never advertised. He worked in this little studio where he made portraits and didn’t even have his name above the door, but people flocked there to have their stereo portraits done on daguerreotype.

I published his book Scenes in our Village, chronicling the village where he grew up as a child, and I want to do more to tell his fascinating life story. It’s on my bucket list.’

Last but not least, a leading London photography gallery is showcasing a selection of the images from the new book. The exhibition at Proud Galleries (located at Charing Cross) will run for five-months. It opened on 3 November and runs until 25 March, 2023. Book tickets at here.

Exclusive discount for AP readers

Stereoscopy is Good For You: Life in 3D book cover. Credit: LSC and Brian May.

Stereoscopy is Good for You: Life in 3-D features images of over 100 modern stereo photographers. These images were of subjects that lifted their spirits during lockdown. AP readers can get a 20% discount using code ap20 when purchasing the book from the London Stereoscopic Company Website. The offer lasts until 1 December, 2022.

Related articles:

Brian May & Denis Pellerin reveal plans for first International Stereoscopy Day

Brian May wants more of your stereo photos (but hurry up)

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The post New Brian May stereo photography book is here appeared first on Amateur Photographer.

Here, Badger talks to us about the book, the history of documentary photography after 1945, and its role in British society.

All photographers love to travel and make work in exotic places. Why not? It’s work and surrogate holiday in one. But it’s a truism to say that the best work done by a country’s photographers is documenting their homeland, or adopted homeland. That’s where they have the biggest stake.

So a history of postwar British documentary photography is a history of the country through specific eyes. Which is why the book is titled Another Country. It is not, and can never be an impartial view. And although a ‘documentary’ view, it is actually a complicated fiction, although that in general means a fiction aiming to tell a truth.

But what is ‘documentary’ photography? The traditional view is that it is inherently ‘straight’ photography – the photographer observes and reports on something, thus making a record of society. But many photographers talk about society in their work, fabricating the images like a film director, even making photographic collages.

Street Musician, ‘Banjo – Jimmy Cross’, Spitalfields, London, 1972 © Ron McCormick

Lewis Balts said photography was ‘a narrow but deep area between the film and the novel’; in this way one can embrace a wider definition of the documentary, viewing it as an attitude – a desire to talk about aspects of society – rather than a style as such.

British photography in the 1940s was clearly very different from today. It tended to be regarded as a ‘trade’ rather than an art form.

Art photography was strictly the province of the camera clubs, while professionals worked to get their imagery in print in the illustrated journals and magazines – the most prestigious of which prior to the 1960s was Picture Post, edited by Tom Hopkinson and employing such photographers as Bert Hardy, Thurston Hopkins, and Grace Robertson. That magazine closed in 1957, but after a brief hiatus it was replaced by the supplemental magazines of the more serious Sunday newspapers – The Times, Observer, and Telegraph.

Blackpool, 1976-77. © Paddy Summerfield

David Bailey, Brian Duffy, and Terence Donovan became the star photographers in the commercial and fashion worlds, importantly representing photographers from working class backgrounds replacing upper middle-class figures like Cecil Beaton.

In reportage photography, David Hurn, Phillip Jones-Griffiths, and Ian Berry became members of the world’s most prestigious agency, Magnum, and together with such figures as John Bulmer, Patrick Ward, and Don McCullin working for the Sunday supplements gave British photography a greater reputation internationally.

Correct Distance, 1985-86. © Mitra Tabrizian

Towards the end of the sixties, a new spirit infused British photography, the notion of the ‘independent’ photographer, largely eschewing commercial photography and using the medium as creative self expression, as a fully fledged art form.

Photography as art had been largely confined to the photographic salons of institutions like the RPS, and although any photographer would regard their imagery in a creative light, the notion of exhibiting photographs as works of art in galleries and museums only became widespread in the 1960s, first in America, and then in Britain in the 1970s.

But photographers working independently and largely disregarding editorial work needed support and the story of British photography in the seventies and eighties is one of the support mechanisms – critical, financial, educational, and institutional – being established to encourage this new spirit in British photography and young photographers embracing the medium.

Untitled, from Stags, Hens & Bunnies, 2014. © Dougie Wallace

In the early 70s, the Victoria and Albert Museum appointed a photography curator in Mark Haworth-Booth; Sotheby’s and Christie’s began to sell photographs as works of art; the Arts Council established a photography administrator, Barry Lane, to provide grants for photographers; and Sue Davies and Dorothy Bohm founded the Photographers’ Gallery in 1971, the first British public gallery to be dedicated solely to photography.

Davies and Bohm’s London enterprise was followed by others throughout the country, such as Val Williams’ Impressions in York. The critical discourse also changed. Two ‘art photography’ magazines, Creative Camera and the shorter-lived Album, essentially promoted the modernist-formalist approach of the American art museum, an approach taken up by young photographers whose aim was to make pictures in the way of artists.

Many were attracted to British themes, inspired by the street photography of Tony Ray-Jones, figures like Chris Killip, Homer Sykes, and Paddy Summerfield. Such work, usually street photography, if not downright documentary photography, was at least in the ‘documentary mode’. The idea of photography as a useful art runs persistently through the British medium.

New Brighton, Merseyside, from The Last Resort, 1983–86. © Martin Parr

The late sixties was the age of political protest, and this was also reflected in the critical discourse of the seventies. Politically minded photographers gravitated towards the Half Moon Gallery and collective in Whitechapel, whose critical journal Camerawork – the antithesis of Alfred Stiegiltz’s early 20th century art photography magazine of the same name – questioned the representational nature of the medium and how to turn it to more progressive ends.

The Half Moon photographers, amongst them Paul Trevor, Chris Steele-Perkins, Mike Abrahams, and Robert Golden, documented the protests and social conditions of the seventies, but the Whitechapel political documentary hotbed was important for another reason.

Inspired by the feminist movement and decades of neglect by the photographic establishment, a whole generation of women photographers established their institutions and added a strong and much-needed voice to British photography.

Hand of Pork, from I Can Help, 1988. © Paul Reas

Britain had always produced great women photographers – Anna Atkins made the first photobook, Julia Margaret Cameron was arguably the finest portraitist of the 19th century, while Tudor Hart, Grace Robertson, Jane Bown, Lee Miller, and Shirley Baker made significant work, but it could be said that the seventies was the first time a coordinated phalanx of women photographers made a collective contribution. Notable figures from the 1970s include Sirkka-Liisa Konttinen, Markéta Luskacová, and Tish Murtha.

Seventies women photographers were often coordinated in a literal as well as psychological sense. For example, the Hackney Flashers Group, which included Jo Spence, Maggie Murray, and Sally Greenhill, worked to raise consciousness about women’s issues, an enterprise which culminated in their Who’s Holding the Baby exhibition in 1978, shown at various venues in 1979.

In their work, the group’s members questioned how much could actually be shown by traditional ‘documentary’ photography and sought to expand or move beyond the strict genre by employing such strategies as collage or staged photography.

Isle of Wight Pop Festival, 1968. © Patrick Ward

Individuals also began to work in this way, such as Jo Spence (ex-Flashers), concentrating upon her own and woman’s health issues, and Karen Knorr, whose phototext pieces from the end of the decade looked at a demographic that was far removed from Whitechapel, wealthy Belgravia residents.

If the 1970s saw the support groups for women photographers established, the 1980s saw the general neglect of ethnic minority photographers at least partially ended with the establishment of the Association of Black Photographers in 1988.

As women had been, ethnic minority photographers had been working in British photography, with even less recognition, since the 1950s. Among the founder members of ABP were Sunil Gupta, Ingrid Pollard, and Rotimi Fany-Kayode. The establishment of their gallery, Autograph, under their director Mark Sealy, was as significant for British documentary photography as that of The Photographers’ Gallery or the Half Moon.

After the Swim iii, from Martha, 2018. © Siân Davey

Two further notable developments mark 1980s photography. The Margaret Thatcher government gave documentary photographers a much-changed society to document or fight against, and much of this work was in colour. The use of colour catapulted such figures as Martin Parr, Paul Graham, Anna Fox, and Nick Waplington into the limelight, while others, Chris Killip or Graham Smith for example, continued to use monochrome.

What is important is that, largely for the first time, through international festivals and wider distribution of photobooks, British photographers became internationally known and respected. This has continued, as the internet has created a global photo village, although the examination of British life and its explaining to other societies would still seem to remain the most vital project for British photography.

Oxford Street, 2002. © David Solomons

Two standout points seem to have emerged from my examination of postwar British documentary photography – apart from the desirability of widening the notion of documentary itself.

First, after the War, photography turned inwards, as did all art, becoming more and more subjective. Perhaps it was also a recognition that there is no such thing as an objective photographer – so the documentary, objective report of the war becomes ‘my diary when embedded with the troops.’ And identity has become an ever more important subject alongside social and economic conditions.

Youth on a Wall, Jarrow, Tyneside, 1976. © Chris Killip

Second, the contribution of immigrants to British photography has been profound. From Jews and other Europeans who came over in the 1930s – including our ‘greatest’ photographer, Bill Brandt – to West Indians in the 1950s and ’60s, and others from all over the world who are coming to live and work here. They have contributed immensely to the impressive diversity of the medium in this country, and given it an honoured place in the worldwide culture that is photography today.

In noting these two points, I come back to my original observation. The best subject for photographers living in Britain, as proven by British photography’s rich history, is surely Great Britain itself.

Another Country?

Another Country: British Documentary Photography Since 1945 by Gerry Badger is published by Thames & Hudson in collaboration with the Martin Parr Foundation: 19 May 2022, RRP £50 hardback. ISBN: 9780500022177.

Another Country: British Documentary Photography Since 1945 is out now on Thames and Hudson. 

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