The Contemporary Photobook Magazine
Review by Douglas Stockdale • Melissa Lazuka’s second self-published artist book Fly Away continues her narrative on the transient nature of her children’s life and her self-awareness that they are very quickly growing up, perhaps way too fast. It is a sequel to her brilliantly conceived artist book Song of the Cicadas that I reviewed... Continue Reading →
Review by Gerhard Clausing • This photobook is based on a retrospective exhibition previously shown at the National Gallery of Art, the Peabody Essex Museum, and the Getty Museum, currently showing at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas, and soon to be at the Jeu de Paume, Paris (June 17 to Sept. 22, 2019)... Continue Reading →
Review by Douglas Stockdale • This is a collective body of work by the husband and wife team of Deanna and Ed Templeton that investigates their upper middle class Southern California neighborhood. Their Huntington Beach (HB) neighborhood is also not far from my residence/studio in Orange County and appears somewhat similar, except for their... Continue Reading →
Review by Douglas Stockdale • Lorena Turner provides an emotional complex personal narrative in her self-published photobook A Habit of Self Deceit. She reveals her lasting emotional trauma sustained during her youth from her alcoholic mother and now after many years, the futility to obtain reconciliation due to her mother’s steady memory decline as a... Continue Reading →
Review by Douglas Stockdale • For better or worse. The marriage vows which can only hint at future possibilities. We are all usually happy about the “better“ events and there is not much to complain about. It’s the “worse” events and conditions that are an unknown and can become ominous. What defines “worse” is also... Continue Reading →
Review by Melanie Chapman • Having recently attended a panel discussion on the topic of Photo-books, this reviewer was reminded of the value of having access to a photographer’s work within reach, available to visit and revisit whenever the mood occurs. To hold a book in one’s hands, to turn the pages at the pace... Continue Reading →
Review by Douglas Stockdale • Food. For some a real love - hate relationship. For others it's just basic fuel to keep the carbon bio-mass moving that day. It's a complex subject with volumes written about it each year; from describing the preparation of complex epicurean delights to the many ways to manage a diet... Continue Reading →
Review by Gerhard Clausing • This photobook is a 40-year retrospective of the work of the distinguished photographer Dawoud Bey, who is also a well-received Professor of Art at Columbia College in Chicago. Others before him have contributed perspectives on some of the same US communities, especially James Van Der Zee, Walker Evans, Gordon Parks,... Continue Reading →
Review by Melanie Chapman • Upon opening UPSTATE for the first time, this reviewer was immediately taken back to her own years spent living in the Hudson Valley while attending Bard College. Not only because the subject of Tema Stauffer’s new work is the nearby city of Hudson and the surrounding landscape, but because Stauffer’s... Continue Reading →
Review by Gerhard Clausing • Every once in a while we see a photobook that hits all the right spots. In Tundra Kids, Ikuru Kuwajima, a multicultural photographer – born in Japan, studied in the United States, and now lives in Russia – has successfully created a book that shows us a minority at the... Continue Reading →
PhotoBook Journal 