The Photograph as Contemporary Art

World of Art

by Charlotte Cotton

A new edition of the definitive title in the field of contemporary art photography by one of the world’s leading experts on the subject, Charlotte Cotton. In the twenty-first century, photography has come of age as a contemporary art form. Almost two centuries after photographic technology was  first invented, the art world has fully embraced it as a legitimate medium, equal in status to painting and sculpture. The Photograph as Contemporary Art introduces the extraordinary range of contemporary art photography, from portraits of intimate life to highly staged directorial spectacles. Arranged thematically, the book reproduces work from a vast span of photographers, including Andreas Gursky, Barbara Kasten, Catherine Opie, Cindy Sherman, Deana Lawson, Diana Markosian, Elle Pérez, Gregory Halpern, Lieko Shiga,  Nan Goldin, Paul Mpagi Sepuya, Pixy Liao, Susan Meiselas, and Zanele Muholi. This fully revised and updated new edition revitalizes previous discussion of works from the 2000s through dialogue with more recent practice. Alongside previously featured work, Charlotte Cotton celebrates a new generation of artists who are shaping photography as a culturally significant medium for our current sociopolitical climate. A superb resource, The Photograph as Contemporary Art is a uniquely broad and diverse reflection of the field. 273 color illustrations

Genres: Photography, Art, Nonfiction, Art History, Theory, Art and Photography, Essays

328 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 2004

About the author

Charlotte Cotton is the curator and head of the Wallis Annenberg Department of Photography at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA). Before joining the museum in 2007, Charlotte was curator of photographs at the Victoria and Albert Museum (1992-2004), the head of programming at The Photographers Gallery (2004-2005) in London. She moved to the US in 2005 and has been visiting professor at Yale University and visiting critic at colleges including Bard, SVA, Cranbrook, Otis, Art Institute Chicago, USC, and UC Riverside.

She is the author of Imperfect Beauty (2000), Guy Bourdin (2003), Then Things Went Quiet (2003) and The Photograph as Contemporary Art (2005). She is also the founding editor of wordswithoutpictures.org.

Reviews

[Sean · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very inspiring and interesting introduction to art photography. I found it challenging and engaging and a great change from ordinary books about photography and technique. This is certainly not a book for the standard digital SLR pusher. It is a refreshing and revelatory discussion of photographic artistic expression.

Although not all the works included appealed to me (I never expected them to given the breadth of talent and styles show cased) I think this is one of the best books on photography I've read.

Well recommended to those seeking more than pretty postcards or "commercial style" photography.

[RC · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent overview of contemporary artists. The third edition was released in 2014, but the bulk of the book seems focused on work that was produced in the late 90s and early 2000s (i.e., Struth, Gursky, Demand, Burtynsky, et al.). So you'll want Portishead and Massive Attack playing in the background. But it's a stylish and bracing collection, intelligently organized. A good introduction to current-ish trends in photography.

[Bethan · Rating 2 out of 5]

I didn't like most of the photographs - soulless and horrible. Then I read the text which made some of them more interesting but it makes me wonder if they can't stand by themselves. Maybe I have been spoilt by looking at classic photographs or this isn't to my taste but it makes me realise how important beauty and softness is, especially if you don't have that interesting content. To be fair, with contemporary art it's not clear yet what is good, and much of it will fade away while I imagine the good stuff will endure over time.

I scanned the most interesting bit of text - it kind of made my jaw drop: http://i237.photobucket.com/albums/ff...

[Андріан · Rating 5 out of 5]

Це не книжка для читання за один вечір. Досвід її прочитання можна порівняти із походом в новий великий супермаркет – від кількості варіантів очі розбігаються, але взяти все одразу неможливо.

Місцями верстка псує враження: фото опиняються далеко від тексту, що їх коментує, і створюють відчуття хаосу. А обсяг матеріалу настільки щільний, що після кількох сторінок хочеться зробити паузу. Але як довідник чи артбук для натхнення вона працює чудово. Ідеальний подарунок для тих, хто живе фотографією

[Nathalie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I recently finished the third edition of this book. You can find a detailed review and overview of its content on my blog , but here is the summary:

I've been passionate about art photography for some years and am always looking for new books to self-educate myself. I liked the book, because it provided me with a framework of art photography by dividing a big amount of photographers (nearly 250) into different chapters. Each chapter showed a specific approach to photography. The book is a great reference book and starting point for finding new approaches and artists to explore.

[Katy Wheatley · Rating 5 out of 5]

An interesting look at the world of photography and how it has come to be accepted into the canon of art in different ways and at different times. This had clear, easy to understand essays with a good collection of colour reproductions at decent sizes to illustrate the points made.

[Ivan · Rating 5 out of 5]

добра книжка
гарно, що є представники з харківської школи

дратувало, що знимки і текст сильно різнилися в місці
себто, бажалося кращішої верстки(в українському виданні)

[Olga Shatokha · Rating 2 out of 5]

I would’ve not find out about most of the artists and works if not for this book. The problem is, I’d rather not.

[Ana · Rating 3 out of 5]

I do not recommend this book. The first chapters are okay and still quite readable and allowed me to have an overview of photographers' perspectives, while the last chapters that portrait more closely modern photography were quite disappointing in content. Moreover, the book should be restructured so that the photos are close to the descriptions and not 3 pages apart, which creates annoyment and no pleasure of read and understand the piece simultaneously.

[Jackson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Worthwhile. The topical focus for each of the sections is interestingly laid out. And within each chapter, photographs are segued seamlessly from one to the next. With a couple more editorial passes, it would have been really good. As it stands, it just reads a little clumsily.

[Megan Daly · Rating 4 out of 5]

GOOD AS A GENERAL INTRODUCTION

[Gilad Ophir · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good and Relevant reading about contemporary photography themes and practitioners.

[Stuart Aken · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an examination of photography employed as a contemporary art medium as things stood approaching 2009 (there’s now an updated version from Aug 2020). There has been an ongoing discussion about the validity of photography as a means of such self-expression. Hopefully, that argument has long been won. There can be no doubt many photographs are considered works of art as opposed to the ‘record’ shots the medium was previously restricted to by the art world. Of course, in the days of the instant camera and, more recently, with advances in digital cameras and software, the whole world of photography, along with writing, and to some degree, music, has become infected with the ‘I can easy do that’ attitude held by many amateurs. That’s not to say many non-professionals lack talent, but it’s undeniable that many people believe ownership of a camera makes them a photographer or even a photographic artist, in the same way possession of a computer with keyboard apparently gifts many barely literate individuals with the title of ‘writer’, the ownership of a guitar makes them a musician. It’s wonderful that people try their hand at new skills, but I’d hope they would serve some form of unofficial apprenticeship and learn the necessary skills before imposing their efforts on the public. Rant over.
The book contains the esoteric language beloved of the contemporary art world. It’s almost as if the sector wishes to exclude ordinary humans from their conversations. I accept some specialist terminology as essential, but overuse of such language can be obstructive to many readers.
The photographic content ranges from the frankly banal through to the beautiful and inspiring. There are 248 pages of text and, I guess, well over that number of photographs, some of which are rather too small to be of value. Most, however, illustrate the various points made by the author.
The book is divided into eight chapters as follows: If This Is Art, Once Upon a Time, Deadpan, Something and Nothing, Intimate Life, Moments in History, Revived and Remade, and Physical and Material. Each section deals with the type of pictures that can be placed under such headings. Over 200 photographers are displayed here, most of whom I’d never heard of. Many of them also work in art with other media as well, using photography as only one means of self-expression.
Talking with a young woman who’d recently finished a degree course in photography and been required to read this book as part of that course, I asked for her opinion and received the dismissive reply ‘It’s bollocks!’, which I can understand. However, I did find the book instructive in various ways regarding the motivation for certain photographers, and the influences and ambitions that lay behind some of the photographs contained in the book. It is what it says on the cover; a comprehensive review of the photograph as contemporary art, and I’m glad I’ve read it and been introduced to a wide group of photographic artists I might otherwise never have encountered.
For those interested, I’ve added a comprehensive list of the featured artists on my personal post of this review, as there are too many to include in a normal review.

[Anastasia Kurinska · Rating 3 out of 5]

Книга побудова досить просто. Є кілька розділів, кожен з яких присвячений певному підходу: відсторонена чи повсякденна фотографія, інсталяція, тощо. Є надзвичайна добірка прикладів, поступово надається увага та детально зупиняємося на кожному.

На початку праці, дуже влучно зазначено, що одна робота не владна охарактеризувати творчість фотографа вцілому. Від себе додам, що це стосується будь-кого, важко оцінити художника чи скульптора, лише за єдиним полотном/скульптурою. До того ж, доволі часто ідейний зміст не грає ролі, важливе лише наше, суб'єктивне, сприйняття.

Як на мене, це саме та книга, котра сподобається будь-кому. Той, хто зацікавлений з професійної точки зору, дізнаєтсья про історію, трансформацію та підходи. Якщо ж ви візьметеся за цей примірник з іншої причини, то напевне переконаєтеся, що фотографія може привертати увагу, викликати резонанс та наштовхувати на зміни.

[Jamie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a survey of contemporary art photography and leans really heavy into Europe and the US. It would have been nice to get more of a global survey. I believe the only artist from LatAm was Joiri Minaya. What about Canada? Nigeria? This could areas could be improved.

I read this book with my class and the students often complained that Cotton's writing style is unapproachable. A lot of them had a difficult time focusing. This book is not for the lay person.I personally didn't have a problem with the writing style. I do wish she spent more time fleshing out her analysis of each photographer.

[Maria Jančová · Rating 5 out of 5]

This modest book has the power to completely change the course of one's mind in the field of photography. Something I felt for a long time, that inner sense of pressure...what if an aesthetically appealing photograph is not enough? Is the medium of photography completely dried out? This peculiar book helped me understand the modern history of photography as a weapon and at the same time a victim of perpetual mutations in modern art. Nicely structured and reader-friendly resume of manifesto of contemporary photography and a brief introduction to current trends in photography.

[Veronica Ruvituso · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ogni capitolo affronta una specifica tematica/ambito della fotografia e, per ogni ambito, l'autrice parla di diversi fotografi citandone il progetto. Sono oltre 170 i fotografi presentati e, a mio avviso, la pecca del libro sta proprio in questo: tutti i progetti fotografici, inseriti come esempio all'interno della specifica tematica trattata, vengono affrontati molto superficialmente. L'attenzione per ogni fotografo, insomma, viene immediatamente distolta dall'attenzione per il fotografo successivo.

[dv · Rating 4 out of 5]

Libro "completista" che ovviamente lambisce la superficie ma ha due grandi pregi: affrontare di petto l'esplorazione della una fotografia "d'arte" (che pure non è definita, come del resto nessuno sembra riuscire a fare); uscirne con un buon bagaglio di conoscenze che funge da trampolino per qualsiasi tipo di esplorazione successiva. Da leggere con Google alla mano, per cercare i lavori dei quasi 300 autori citati.

[Mark Sexton · Rating 3 out of 5]

a whistle stop tour of loosely themed contemporary photography that trends towards being a list of artists and their gallery blurbs. As a light survey it works okay, but possibly highlights how tricky photography is to pigeonhole as the themes are broad and nebulous, the groupings not terribly cohesive and there being more - 'okay, but why?' moments than context and criticism to help centre the example works.

[Shen. J ♥︎ · Rating 5 out of 5]

had to read this for my upper level photography class. i really enjoyed it! cotton has a very concise way of explaining periods and genre of photography. while i didn’t always agree with her analysis of some artists work i know it’s partially because of the very limited time and space to display them and their conceptual ideas while reaching for the overarching topic. this book is a wonderful resource! will be looking through it again in the future for inspiration or references

[Nigel Walker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Enjoyed this. A good overview of photography at this point in time and how it has developed. You can also dip in and out rather than necessarily read sequentially which I often find helpful with book like this.

[meganelizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

my professor assigned this book as our textbook for a photo projects class I took in my last year of my undergrad. really enjoyed reading it and having round table discussions about the themes and artists trough each chapter. fun textbook, lots of great work and inspiring.

[Sara · Rating 4 out of 5]

È un libro davvero ben scritto, va subito al sodo ad ogni capitolo spiegando in modo rapido e con tantissime immagini cosa si intende per fotografia contemporanea e soprattutto quanti generi diversi esistono. In più sono venuta a conoscenza di tant* fotograf* che non conoscevo.

[Elisa Pierandrei · Rating 4 out of 5]

Completo e davvero ben scritto.

[Federica · Rating 4 out of 5]

4-ish, 3.5

[Alan T. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very informative, interesting enough to introduce me to photographers and summarizes photographs too.

[Anya · Rating 4 out of 5]

Дает общее представление о современной фотографии с отставанием на пару лет. Хорошая база для понимания того, что в этом искусстве происходит сейчас.

[KJP · Rating 4 out of 5]

Książka świetna, tłumaczenie fatalne

[Rosiles · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is great.

[Christina Wang · Rating 4 out of 5]

很有啟發性又系統的當代攝影入門書。當代藝術講求idea，解構，反叛，攝影師要活地多抽離呢？真正的在場與永恆是不是永遠無法共存？