In October's livres du Mois I recap more of the photographers that I have written about this year with a collection of books of their work. Now some of the photographers I have featured on the Compendium are so niche that they have no written material to share, which ironically are also some of the most interesting photographers, so those individuals are missing from the list. Organised in chronological order, we begin with John Dugdale.
Life's Evening hour
John Dugdale
"In Life's Evening Hour, photographer John Dugdale invites us to explore liminal territory -- the realm between sight and blindness, between day and night, between physical and emotional. Celebrated for his imaginative use of the 19th century cyanotype process, Dugdale's blue images are distinct for their subtle and lyrical quality as well as their emotional resonance.
In 1993 Dugdale lost 80 percent of his sight to an HIV-related illness, but has continued to pursue his art, as his creative vision has only grown stronger. This book bears witness to the photographs he created from the onset of his blindness to the present through Dugdale's photographs and words. The design of Life's Evening Hour complements the thoughtful nature of the photographs, and making reference to personal journals and common prayer books, the slipcase, clothbound binding, fine printing and papers as well as ribbon to mark pages distinguish this book as a high-quality collection of a unique photographer's work."
Jazz
Herman Leonard
This collection includes Leonard's classic photographs of the greats of jazz: from Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington and Dexter Gordon to Frank Sinatra and Tony Bennett. His uniquely evocative and cinematic portraits of jazz's most iconic figures in their heyday have gone on to become iconic images in their own right.
This definitive and beautifully produced collection of his work includes all Leonard's most famous images as well as a significant number of previously unpublished photographs.
Paris Fifties:
Regards de Mode
Georges Dambier
"Georges Dambier was one of the first fashion photographers to take models out of the studio and into the streets, staging them in natural settings. It was Dambier’s ability to put his subjects at ease (many of them were friends) that helped him create true, intimate and lasting images. With his delicate style, and refined technique, his work revealed a reality of great elegance. As his career blossomed, he became widely known for his ability to capture the essence of feminine chic and glamour in his images."
Willy Ronis by Willy Ronis:
The Master Photographer's Unpublished Albums
"A key figure in twentieth-century photography, Willy Ronis conveyed the poetic reality of postwar France in iconic black and white photographs. Influenced by Alfred Steiglitz and Ansel Adams, and amicable with his contemporary Magnum photographers, Ronis was the first French photographer to contribute to Life magazine. In the 1950s, MoMA curator Edward Steichen featured Ronis―along with Henri- Cartier Bresson, Robert Doisneau, and Brassaï― in the groundbreaking exhibitions The Family of Man and Five French Photographers .
Throughout his life, this powerhouse of humanist photography kept meticulous record of his work, curating each era into albums, which are reproduced here for the first time. Timeless photographs of postwar France and its inhabitants are accompanied by the photographer’s original observations and comments, framing the images within their technical and historical context. Photography historian Matthieu Rivallin’s critical perspective adds nuance to the photographer’s notes, and the ensemble is a groundbreaking and definitive reference on the myriad aspects of the artists’ immense career and is an essential volume for all photography aficionados."
George Tice
Selected Photographs
1953-1999
"The enduring work of American photographer George Tice is represented here in 80 black-and-white images, beautifully presented in a small format book. His work depicts a broad range of American life, landscape, and urban environment, mostly photographed in his native New Jersey."
Louis Faurer
by
Anne Wilkes-Tucker
"Louis Faurer was known for his raw, melancholy and psychologically charged pictures of life on the streets. This book is the first to examine Faurer's work in depth, bringing together a great deal of previously unpublished material, as well as images not seen since they originally appeared in magazines in the 1940s and 1950s."
I hope you have discovered something (or someone) new amongst these books but if not you may find a book more to your taste in the Compendium's Library.
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