The Contemporary Photobook Magazine
Review by Melanie Chapman • Now that new COVID infection rates are decreasing, “the world” seems eager to open up again after more than 700 days of lock down and rationing basic necessities such as food, medicine and even toilet paper. Millions of people have seen restrictions relaxed and have begun traveling again, for business and... Continue Reading →
Review by Douglas Stockdale • R. A. Hansen’s photobook, dreaming backwards, is a nostalgic and poetic retrospective of an early body of work set in the rural landscape of middle America, the grand expanses where he was raised in Iowa. Hansen’s photographs are combined with his poems and personal reflections on these poignant early moments of his... Continue Reading →
Review by Douglas Stockdale • An apt way to describe Ewa Monika Zebrowski’s artist book, van gogh’s bed, is that it has punctum, a work of art that is imbued with emotional impact. Which also serves as a subtle clue, for those who are familiar with Roland Barthes, the late French philosopher, as to the indirect subject of this body... Continue Reading →
Review by Wayne Swanson • Toshio Shibata likes to blur boundaries. Between the natural and the human-made. Between the representational and the abstract. Between photography and drawing. Shibata, one of Japan's preeminent landscape photographers, has focused his attention since the early 1980s on the intersection of nature and infrastructure, finding art in scenes of bridges, dams,... Continue Reading →
Review by Gerhard Clausing • Connecting with the past is a challenge, particularly when the present is such a mess – viruses, warfare, economic worries, etc., etc. As I am writing this, a major new assault on yet another group of people is in progress: this time the victims are the Ukrainians. How many more... Continue Reading →
PBJ Issue Number 35 • February became a difficult month for those who love democracy, with an unrelenting attack of Ukraine by a madman in Russia. We are unsure of how this will end, but I am voting for the people of Ukraine to persevere. Remember, most Russian citizens do not support this war, thus as you consider what Russian goods to... Continue Reading →
Review by Gerhard Clausing • Peter Hujar was a photographer who chronicled the cultural scene of New York City in the 1970s and 1980s. He was also known for his magical ways in photographing animals, as well as for his focus on what was then called ‘figure studies.’ He seemed unwilling or unable to play... Continue Reading →
Review by Melanie Chapman • As the saying goes: You can’t judge a book by its Cover. In the case of the new Thames and Hudson publication “Face Time: A History of the Photographic Portrait”, edited by Phillip Rodger, the cover itself agrees. Two youths are photographed with slight variations in perspective so that each looks... Continue Reading →
Review by Gerhard Clausing • Not too long ago, the term “abandoned moments” meant images that we would toss aside: subject not significant enough, not sharp enough, some blurring or out-of-focus areas, camera movement, and more. Well, nowadays that is the stuff that the finest photographic art is made of; they are the central techniques... Continue Reading →
Review by Douglas Stockdale • I may not be a relationship expert, but I highly suspect that stating the reason for another person to stay in a relationship is that otherwise if they left all of the plants would die may not be the most enticing of rationales. The book’s title appears to be a retrospective... Continue Reading →
PhotoBook Journal 