The Contemporary Photobook Magazine
Review by Douglas Stockdale • Marseille – A True Fictional Photostory Hans Hickerson’s Marseille backstory is that this is a series of photographs that were captured in August 1983. A time when “You think the grass is greener somewhere else, but then you travel and discover that it is not…you go somewhere else, but you are the... Continue Reading →
Review by Lee Halvorsen • I was drawn to this book by the image on its cover promising a deep look into the city, people, and texture of Calcutta (Kolkata), and I was not disappointed. Kowshik is a street photographer, and his book immerses us into the places, cultures, and people of Kolkata. His images... Continue Reading →
Review by Lee Halvorsen • Imagine sitting in an overstuffed chair, in a hushed, book-lined sanctuary, completely spellbound by a virtuoso storyteller spinning tales of love, war, resilience, post-war recovery in Europe and the canvas of artistic mid-century New York City. This wonderful collection of firsthand images of post-war transitions in Europe and Manhattan was... Continue Reading →
Review by Olga Bubich · Addressing traumatic or otherwise challenging pasts and processing childhood trauma have long been among the most common subjects in photography, and photobooks are no exception. Every year, numerous projects are created, sharing with distant readers stories of close proximity: those of complicated – or non-existent – relationships with fathers, those... Continue Reading →
Review by Lee Halvorsen • This book is a masterful blend of history, urban transformation, and culture brought together in the context of a street known round the world: Manhattan’s Broadway. Throughout 1905, C.G. Hine a businessman and amateur photographer made images along Broadway, organized them geographically by city block, and then created hand-made books... Continue Reading →
Review by Lee Halvorsen • This delightful photographic journey through parts of Mexico is a fun, heartfelt connection to the culture and the car that brings them together. That car, an icon of their national identity, imagination, and energy, is the Volkswagen Bug, The Beetle, and, in Mexico Los Vochos! Villar moved to Mexico in 2016 with... Continue Reading →
Review by Rudy Vega · Sean Perry’s Fairgrounds is a modest book in scale but not in feeling. There are no crowds, no bright over the top color, and no appetite for nostalgia as popular entertainment. Instead, the book treats the fairground as a site of afterimage and projection: a place to re-enter through atmosphere.... Continue Reading →
Review by Gerhard Clausing • How do you show moods and emotions in your photographs? How are a photographer’s feelings transmitted? And what about the people being photographed, and what do places and environments signal to us? Furthermore, what is the nature of the relationship between the photographer and the model? Such are the issues... Continue Reading →
Review by Hans Hickerson · No wonder many photographers have given up using photography to hunt down and capture individual images of things seen in the world. Today with photobook publishing so accessible photographers have other possibilities. Exploring your past, for example. Or your family relationships. Or a particular historical time and place. Or, as... Continue Reading →
Review by Hans Hickerson · Is it just my impression or are there fewer photobooks today about observed, external, “objective” reality and more about the inner reality of relationships and personal situations? Photographers are using books to explore their lives and experiences – mothers and daughters, daughters and fathers, brothers, sisters, parents, families. Elizabeth Clark... Continue Reading →
PhotoBook Journal 