Thanks to Kevin’s suggestion, these are in-fact Amazon affiliate links. That won’t effect anything on your end, of course.
Owning photography monographs is such a great investment and will continue to pay dividends. It will fill your visual well with all kinds of possibilities, and they are a great place to turn whenever you feel you are in a creative slump. Start your photography library today and continue adding to it all your life, little by little.
Here are the books we looked at during the workshop
Nicholas Nixon: The Brown Sisters
This is the 40 year edition. The first time it came out, it was 25 years. Then there was an edition of 33 years.
There’s a few Arnold Newman monographs. I love this one.
There is no one else like her and I love the way she sees.
Doug DuBois: All The Days And Nights
A more melancholy view of family portraits.
Mary Ellen Mark has a number of great monographs, all great. This one is out of print but can still be found for low prices.
F.W. Glasier: Wild Weird and Wonderful
This is the one we looked at in class but there’s another called Circus-The photographs of Frederick W. Glasier that is a little newer.
I honestly cannot remember if we looked at this book or not but either way, this is a photographer you should know about. And he’s probably the most prolific photographer around. He has over 60 monographs. This one is a good one to start with and can be found at good prices, but for sure it’s worth exploring some of his other titles.
Latoya Ruby Frazier: The Notion of Family
Powerful. Documenting the economic decline of her family history. This is another book that can be found at a low cost.
His most well known monograph and the one that got him lots of attention is called Sleeping By The Mississippi. I really like this one and From Here To There
We did not look at any pictures in here when we were all looking at books, but I mentioned him a couple times and there were some of his images in the slides. He’s one of my favorites of all times.
David Hurn/Bill Jay: On Being a Photographer
This is one book I think everyone photographer should own and read. Amazon’s description says “One of the most popular books ever written with practical advice for photographers. It was out of print for a long time and the price went sky high, but it’s back in print and can be had for around 20 bucks. I mentioned this book in class when I went over the four steps to make a good picture.
Here are some that we didn’t look at, didn’t discuss but are photographers that are in that category I mentioned that are the Beatles of photography or the William Shakespeare of photography, or are just great books worth considering
Robert Frank - The Americans (Every photographer should own this book)
Irving Penn - Passage, A Work Record
Rodney Smith - Rodney Smith Photographs
Henri Cartier-Bresson - The Decisive Moment
Magnum - Contact Sheets
Diane Arbus - Diane Arbus
Elliott Ewitt - Snaps
Garry Winnogrand - Figments From a Real World
William Eggleston - William Eggleston’s Guide
There are SO many more but this is a good starting point.