The Contemporary Photobook Magazine
Review by Gerhard Clausing • Kevin Bubriski has long been recognized for his special ability to document various groups and communities with sensitivity and respect, from Nepal to the American heartland. In The New Mexicans, his attentive look is focused on the people and landscapes of New Mexico, capturing the early 1980s in a photographic... Continue Reading →
Review by Gerhard Clausing • In Zero Hour, Birthe Piontek continues her exploration of identity and mortality. Known for her psychologically charged portraiture and introspective photographic storytelling (especially in Abendlied, which I reviewed previously), Piontek’s newest photobook connects the personal and the universal in a significant visual narrative. The term “Zero Hour” is historically charged—it... Continue Reading →
Review by Steve Harp · In 1975 Martha Rosler exhibited a group of 24 diptychs titled “The Bowery in Two Inadequate Descriptive Systems.” The work juxtaposes banal images (think of Ed Ruscha’s gasoline stations) of rundown facades in New York’s Bowery district with text panels listing euphemisms for inebriated states (“blind drunk,” “dead drunk,” “embalmed,” “buried,” “gone”). The... Continue Reading →
Review by Paul Anderson • What better place to look for spooks and monsters than in the dark underground tunnels of the New York subway system? If you are a ghostly inhabitant of that world, what better time to reveal yourself than on Halloween night? Indeed, if you are a photographer seeking glimpses of the... Continue Reading →
Review by Gerhard Clausing • Berlin is most certainly a very complex and dynamic European city. The population includes people from all kinds of countries with all kinds of backgrounds, and at the same time the city shows a great deal of tolerance regarding behavioral idiosyncrasies and various belief systems when you compare it to... Continue Reading →
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 →
Review by Douglas Stockdale • Whose land is it? This is probably the underlying question for Lana Z Caplan’s photodocumentary project of an expansive region of coastal California, which also represents a broader question for all of North America and the world beyond. Her specific subject is an area generally identified as Oceano, located on the... Continue Reading →
Review by Rudy Vega • The world’s longest shared border is between Canada and the United States. Dubbed the International Boundary, it spans 8,891 kilometers (5,525 miles) and holds the distinction of being the world's longest undefended border. This fact is highlighted in Zero Line Boundary, a new book by Robert Lyons. The compilation consists... Continue Reading →
Review by Douglas Stockdale · The COVID-19 pandemic turned our normal accustomed social interactions on its head and had a huge impact on our global society. In conjunction with the resulting medical misery, many governments implemented home quarantine as a means to limit the spread of this highly contagious virus. It’s one thing to leave and... Continue Reading →
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 →
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