Review by Douglas Stockdale • Katherine Longly and Cécile Hupin have created a conceptual photojournalistic project; a series of interviews, quotes, screen grabs and reuse of photographs, repurposed to create a narrative that asks the question: If money cannot buy happiness, what drives people to participate in a lottery? The book is design and sequenced in... Continue Reading →
Henry Schulz – people things
Review by Gerhard Clausing • The most extraordinary photobooks are those that have a grip on you and become very personal as you spend more time with them. Henry Schulz’s book is precisely that kind of a project. In 61 images he presents assemblages of human elements that cut through time and space. Even though... Continue Reading →
Shelby Lee Adams – From the Heads of the Hollers
Review by Melanie Chapman • “Never did bother Nobody”: The grounded and authentic culture of rural Kentucky as seen by a native son, From the Heads of the Hollers is a gorgeous new GOST publication of portraits by Kentucky native Shelby Lee Adams. Representing previously unpublished work made over 36 years, Adams’ environmental portraits... Continue Reading →
Andrew Kochanowski – The Grift
Review by Matt Schneider · The Grift begins with a short piece of reflective commentary by photographer Andrew Kochanowski. Here, he playfully describes something of a circus meets pyramid scheme. Crowds chanting now familiar phrases like, “Lock her up!” and “Build the wall!” Recurring bits about “Hoaxes, taxes, a grievance extravaganza.” Celebrity appearances from American politicians, the... Continue Reading →
Gerry Badger – Another Country: British Documentary Photography Since 1945
Review by Gerhard Clausing • To cover more than 70 years of history and the accompanying photographic styles and to make an interesting photobook out of it requires quite a bit of talent. Gerry Badger, with all his editorial and curatorial background, is the one that can accomplish such a gargantuan task; he presents all... Continue Reading →
Caio Reisewitz – Altamira
Review by Brian O’Neill • There is a QR code at the end of several additional texts that come inserted with this book that takes you into the Amazon rainforest, roughly 70% of which is within the territorial boundaries of the nation-state we call Brazil. Those sounds are at once familiar to me – the buzzing activity... Continue Reading →
Bob Newman – Shadows of Emmett Till
Review by Wayne Swanson • In 1955, a 14-year-old Black youth from Chicago, visiting relatives in the South, walked into Bryant’s Grocery Store in rural Money, Mississippi. Emmett Till wasn’t inside long, but he is said to have whistled at a white woman behind the counter. A few days later his body — beaten, shot, and... Continue Reading →
Pradip Malde – From Where Loss Comes
Reviewed by Madhu Joseph-John • This is what you might first see when you have Pradip Malde’s photo book in your hand: women, young and old, some with head covers, some with razor blade in hand, others grinding a clay like mass with stones, girls with their legs splayed and being held down by women, acacia... Continue Reading →
Makeda Best, Editor – Devour the Land
Review by Douglas Stockdale • While we at PhotoBook Journal tend to defer from broad thematic photobooks with a multitude of contributors, and in general the illustrated catalogs for exhibitions usually have little design and layout merit. I take exception with the recent exhibition publication in conjunction with Harvard Art Museums being very worth investigating. The exhibition and... Continue Reading →
Allan Sekula – Fish Story
Review by Brian F. O’Neill • Fish Story, the last major project/publication by Southern California based photographer, filmmaker, critic, teacher, and theorist Allan Sekula was originally released coincident with a touring exhibition that began in Rotterdam, Netherlands in 1995 and concluded in Kassel, Germany in 2002. In June of 2018, it was re-released by London headquartered... Continue Reading →