What do you think?
Rate this book
Walker Evans: American Photographs
First published in 1938 by The Museum of Modern Art, American Photographs, an Indisputable classic, has often been out of print. This new fiftieth-anniversary edition, with duotone plates made from prints and the original design and typography re-created as precisely as possible, makes Evan's landmark available again. The following statement appeared on the jacket of the 1938 edition. The use of the visual arts to show us our own moral and economic situation has today fallen almost completely into the hands of the photographer. It is for him to fix and to reveal the whole aspect of our society: to record for use in the future our disasters and our claims to divinity. Walker Evans, photographing in New England or Louisiana, watching a Cuban political funeral or a Mississippi flood, working cautiously so as to disturb nothing in the normal atmosphere of the average place, can be considered a kind of disembodied, burrowing eye, a conspirator against time and its hammers. His photographs are the records of contemporary civilization in eastern America. In the reproductions presented here two large divisions have been made. The photographs are arranged to be seen in their given sequence. In the first part, which might be labeled "People by Photography," we have an aspect of America for which it would be difficult to claim too much. The physiognomy of a nation is laid on your table. In the second part are pictures which refer to the continuous fact of an indigenous American expression, whatever its source, whatever form it has taken, whether in sculpture, paint, or architecture: that native accent we find again in Kentucky mountain and cowboy ballads and in contemporary swing-music.
Hardcover
First published January 1, 1938
6 people are currently reading
580 people want to read
About the author
Walker Evans
110 books52 followersWalker Evans (November 3, 1903 – April 10, 1975) was an American photographer best known for his work for the Farm Security Administration (FSA) documenting the effects of the Great Depression. Much of Evans's work from the FSA period uses the large-format, 8x10-inch camera. He said that his goal as a photographer was to make pictures that are "literate, authoritative, transcendent".
Many of his works are in the permanent collections of museums and have been the subject of retrospectives at such institutions as The Metropolitan Museum of Art or George Eastman House.
In 2000, Evans was inducted into the St. Louis Walk of Fame
Many of his works are in the permanent collections of museums and have been the subject of retrospectives at such institutions as The Metropolitan Museum of Art or George Eastman House.
In 2000, Evans was inducted into the St. Louis Walk of Fame
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews
November 28, 2024
The American Photographs Of Walker Evans
This celebrated book of Walker Evans (1903 -- 1975), "American Photographs", has a long history. In 1938, the Museum of Modern Art presented an exhibition of Evans' photographs taken during the late 1920s -- early 1930s. Evans selected and arranged 87 photographs from the exhibit and divided them into two sections of 50 and 37 photos. The Museum of Modern Art published the book that resulted under the title "American Photographs" together with an introductory essay by the noted philanthropist, writer, and impresario, Lincoln Kirstein. Over the years, the book went in and out of print in various editions. The Museum issued a 25th anniversary edition in 1962, which also went out of print, followed by a 50-year anniversary edition in 1988. In 2012, the Museum issued the 75th anniversary edition of Evans' classic. The book recently appeared on the new book shelf of my local library, and I wondered why. The 75th anniversary edition went through its fourth printing in 2019, once more making the book available to new readers.
This book is both a work of art and also a moving picture of America. The photographs eloquently and faithfully depict scenes from the Great Depression, capturing rural, small town, and urban America, poor and wealthy, white and black. Most of the photos are from the East Coast, ranging from New England to Alabama and Mississippi with a few photos from Cuba as well. The photos show people, places, and structures of the Era.
The two parts of the book represent "People by Photography" in the first and "indigenous American expression" in the second. Evans designed the book carefully. He wanted the reader to view the photographs in the sequence in which they appeared and not to be distracted by text. Thus, the listing of photographs appears at the end of each section. Evans was wise in arranging the book in this way to allow the reader to concentrate both on each individual photograph and on the cumulative impact of the collection. I viewed the photographs several times as Evans had intended and then viewed them with the captions at the back of each section.
These photographs are gritty and sad. Some of the individual photographs have become famous and widely reproduced. The photographs in this book capture a harsh and changing time. Even with all the Depression-Era poverty and loneliness, the photos display a strength and a sense of vision. They invite both reflection and a sense of hope. I was glad to find this new printing of Evans' book and to think about his portrait of America.
Robin Friedman
This celebrated book of Walker Evans (1903 -- 1975), "American Photographs", has a long history. In 1938, the Museum of Modern Art presented an exhibition of Evans' photographs taken during the late 1920s -- early 1930s. Evans selected and arranged 87 photographs from the exhibit and divided them into two sections of 50 and 37 photos. The Museum of Modern Art published the book that resulted under the title "American Photographs" together with an introductory essay by the noted philanthropist, writer, and impresario, Lincoln Kirstein. Over the years, the book went in and out of print in various editions. The Museum issued a 25th anniversary edition in 1962, which also went out of print, followed by a 50-year anniversary edition in 1988. In 2012, the Museum issued the 75th anniversary edition of Evans' classic. The book recently appeared on the new book shelf of my local library, and I wondered why. The 75th anniversary edition went through its fourth printing in 2019, once more making the book available to new readers.
This book is both a work of art and also a moving picture of America. The photographs eloquently and faithfully depict scenes from the Great Depression, capturing rural, small town, and urban America, poor and wealthy, white and black. Most of the photos are from the East Coast, ranging from New England to Alabama and Mississippi with a few photos from Cuba as well. The photos show people, places, and structures of the Era.
The two parts of the book represent "People by Photography" in the first and "indigenous American expression" in the second. Evans designed the book carefully. He wanted the reader to view the photographs in the sequence in which they appeared and not to be distracted by text. Thus, the listing of photographs appears at the end of each section. Evans was wise in arranging the book in this way to allow the reader to concentrate both on each individual photograph and on the cumulative impact of the collection. I viewed the photographs several times as Evans had intended and then viewed them with the captions at the back of each section.
These photographs are gritty and sad. Some of the individual photographs have become famous and widely reproduced. The photographs in this book capture a harsh and changing time. Even with all the Depression-Era poverty and loneliness, the photos display a strength and a sense of vision. They invite both reflection and a sense of hope. I was glad to find this new printing of Evans' book and to think about his portrait of America.
Robin Friedman
December 2, 2022
These images aren’t just a document of the 1930s in America; they invite you to experience the people, sites, spaces, and architecture in a way that feels like time travel. These photos feel more “real” than even the sound documentary films I’ve seen of the Depression era. Don’t ask me how Evans achieves that feeling. It’s a level of authenticity that is both like cinema verite and confessional poetry – two entirely different art forms that were still decades from existing, yet Evans’ photos in this book seem to be the visual evocation of both at once. Required for anyone interested in photography, American history, the Depression, visual arts, modernism, cultural studies, and probably twenty other fields that I can’t enumerate off the top-of-my-head at the moment.
February 16, 2024
(4.5 stars.) A couple decades into the twenty-first century, it may be difficult for people to see what all the fuss is about, with Walker Evans. It's hard to think of an analogy, but maybe something like how baseball players didn't intentionally try to hit home runs until Babe Ruth made it a strategy, and now we can't think of baseball being played any other way? Evans did that for fine art photography.
Evans is the square root of Ernst Haas and Robert Frank (Frank's The Americans basically plagiarizes the 'street' half of American Photographs) and all the NYC street photographers, and is somehow also the square root of New Topographics and Robert Adams and Shore/Sternfeld and that whole scene (the crisp compositions and perfect framing). Though Evans worked for the FSA, his photographs (like those of Lange and a couple others) almost entirely transcend that context. Every page of American Photographs has been referenced by, or influential upon, the best photographers of the past eight decades: the greatest American photobooks of the past twenty years, like Soth's Sleeping by the Mississippi, are unimaginable without Evans. American Photographs was the first MoMA show dedicated to a single photographer, and it's easy to see why; though he had a handful of precursors (Stieglitz's later work? Atget, sort of?), he's the first real step past pictorialism in fine art photography.
Evans is the square root of Ernst Haas and Robert Frank (Frank's The Americans basically plagiarizes the 'street' half of American Photographs) and all the NYC street photographers, and is somehow also the square root of New Topographics and Robert Adams and Shore/Sternfeld and that whole scene (the crisp compositions and perfect framing). Though Evans worked for the FSA, his photographs (like those of Lange and a couple others) almost entirely transcend that context. Every page of American Photographs has been referenced by, or influential upon, the best photographers of the past eight decades: the greatest American photobooks of the past twenty years, like Soth's Sleeping by the Mississippi, are unimaginable without Evans. American Photographs was the first MoMA show dedicated to a single photographer, and it's easy to see why; though he had a handful of precursors (Stieglitz's later work? Atget, sort of?), he's the first real step past pictorialism in fine art photography.
February 27, 2011
The Grandaddy of all American Photo books. Beautiful, bleak, mysterious, and one can smell the depression right off the pages. Great.
January 2, 2020
The first half is brilliant, as advertised. Still trying to figure out the architectural photographs in the second half of the book -- they must have signified more back when they were shot and I'm stymied by my own ignorance of various historical styles.
December 18, 2015
The first thing to note about this book is that it is separated into two parts. The first part is about American people, the second about American buildings. I suspect that there isn’t too much difference between these two sections. They are just different ways of exploring the same subject and themes. However, I struggled a lot more with the second part. Reading pictures of buildings is difficult, the meanings and purpose of the pictures more elusive. Which is odd because we all see buildings everyday, right?
The first section of the book reads like a book of short stories. Each photograph is a story and each story reflects the others in the section, through elaboration and contrast. Evans subtly links all these stories through the subject matter of the photographs themselves. For instance, photograph 8 is a hand painted gas sign. Photograph 9 is the side of a lunch truck with hand painted prices and an image of a couple in a car eating a burger. Photograph 10 is a picture of an actual couple driving a car. This sort of narrative thread passes though almost every picture in this section. The few pictures that seem to be a break with this movement are more likely due to my failure to pick out the thread. It took awhile, but I noticed a similar sort of thread in section 2 of the book. However, the thread seemed to be in the design elements of the houses and buildings. The presence and slight differences in the lattice work of each subsequent photograph, for instance, possibly bearing testament to the character of the individuals in the house or the climate they lived in.
As for the purpose of this book, this isn’t contemporary photography (at least not the stereotype of art photography). This is Evans’ attempt to instill a wide portrait of America in a particular moment. Initially, this portrait seemed to be one of entropy, and its contrasts, but by the end of the book I felt like Evans was getting at something else as well. The contrasts within the narrative threads create unexpected similarities. The rural girl wearing sun-bleached hand-me-downs in one photograph turns into the big city socialite in the next. And the socialite could just as easily be the African American in Harlem under the elevated train. As a final point, the pictures were taken around the time of the Depression. I could say I forgot how poor America was, but really I never learned it like this.
My favorite picture is photo 14, section 1.
The first section of the book reads like a book of short stories. Each photograph is a story and each story reflects the others in the section, through elaboration and contrast. Evans subtly links all these stories through the subject matter of the photographs themselves. For instance, photograph 8 is a hand painted gas sign. Photograph 9 is the side of a lunch truck with hand painted prices and an image of a couple in a car eating a burger. Photograph 10 is a picture of an actual couple driving a car. This sort of narrative thread passes though almost every picture in this section. The few pictures that seem to be a break with this movement are more likely due to my failure to pick out the thread. It took awhile, but I noticed a similar sort of thread in section 2 of the book. However, the thread seemed to be in the design elements of the houses and buildings. The presence and slight differences in the lattice work of each subsequent photograph, for instance, possibly bearing testament to the character of the individuals in the house or the climate they lived in.
As for the purpose of this book, this isn’t contemporary photography (at least not the stereotype of art photography). This is Evans’ attempt to instill a wide portrait of America in a particular moment. Initially, this portrait seemed to be one of entropy, and its contrasts, but by the end of the book I felt like Evans was getting at something else as well. The contrasts within the narrative threads create unexpected similarities. The rural girl wearing sun-bleached hand-me-downs in one photograph turns into the big city socialite in the next. And the socialite could just as easily be the African American in Harlem under the elevated train. As a final point, the pictures were taken around the time of the Depression. I could say I forgot how poor America was, but really I never learned it like this.
My favorite picture is photo 14, section 1.
January 25, 2015
A wonderful photography book and now must go to the Met the next time I am in town.
June 7, 2017
Link: https://readstoodamnmuch.wordpress.co...
American Photographs begins on a pointedly metaphorical note. The first picture displays a photo shop with a photo booth. The words “Photos: 5 Cents” appear all over. The viewer’s eyes are drawn to a pair of fingers surrounding the darkened entrance of the phone booth. “Come on in, enter, and experience some photography” the opening image tantalizes. I bring this initial image up because a casual Google search would make you think Walker Evans’s work mostly consisted of his portraits for the Farm Security Administration. You might think Evans’s work is no different than other portraiture of the poor in the era like Dorothea Lange’s Migrant Mother. What I found was a much more complex photographer, dedicated not just to capturing the faces but the world of those he photographed. And as the opening picture indicates, Evans’s has a commitment to the photobook format, making one loaded with symbolic value and meaning.
I came to Walker Evans out-of-order after reading Robert Frank’s The Americans, and the intertextual relationships between the two are apparent. Both have pictures of empty barber shops; Frank’s version is shot through the window, the image of the barber’s chair criss-crossed with screens. The ecstasy of a Confederate monument in Vicksburg in Evans’s parallels the ecstasy of the person at a political rally in Chicago in Frank. Like Robert Frank, candid photography does not hide the presence of the photographer; often there is someone who is looking at Walker Evans with suspicious eyes. And like Frank, Evans often opts for photographs with open-ended, incomplete narratives. People in a car stare towards something not pictured. We can only guess what. We see a room in disrepair, and in the back a door leading to another room trashed with clothes and furniture parts. A sign saying “The Lord Will Provide” hangs crookedly in the front. What is its meaning? It’s unclear.
Walker Evans has a fascination with architecture, showing the relationship between person and structure. In many photographs store and store owner become part of the entity. This is also the case with what may be Evans’s most famous photograph, the portrait of an unnamed Alabama Cotton Tenant Farmer Wife. The straight line of her mouth in grim determination becomes one with the straight lines of the building behind her. Many other photographs show houses slanted, as if the very infrastructure of American capitalism is buckling under pressure.
One key difference between Robert Frank and Walker Evans that benefits Evans is his key appreciation of what would now be considered “street art.” Torn and folded posters, elaborate and dilapidated murals, a row of advertisements along the street, and even graffiti are given equal attention to the houses and the people. It is a surprisingly progressive perspective, and one I don’t know if it has parallels in other media of the time (I would love to be proven wrong).
American Photographs begins on a pointedly metaphorical note. The first picture displays a photo shop with a photo booth. The words “Photos: 5 Cents” appear all over. The viewer’s eyes are drawn to a pair of fingers surrounding the darkened entrance of the phone booth. “Come on in, enter, and experience some photography” the opening image tantalizes. I bring this initial image up because a casual Google search would make you think Walker Evans’s work mostly consisted of his portraits for the Farm Security Administration. You might think Evans’s work is no different than other portraiture of the poor in the era like Dorothea Lange’s Migrant Mother. What I found was a much more complex photographer, dedicated not just to capturing the faces but the world of those he photographed. And as the opening picture indicates, Evans’s has a commitment to the photobook format, making one loaded with symbolic value and meaning.
I came to Walker Evans out-of-order after reading Robert Frank’s The Americans, and the intertextual relationships between the two are apparent. Both have pictures of empty barber shops; Frank’s version is shot through the window, the image of the barber’s chair criss-crossed with screens. The ecstasy of a Confederate monument in Vicksburg in Evans’s parallels the ecstasy of the person at a political rally in Chicago in Frank. Like Robert Frank, candid photography does not hide the presence of the photographer; often there is someone who is looking at Walker Evans with suspicious eyes. And like Frank, Evans often opts for photographs with open-ended, incomplete narratives. People in a car stare towards something not pictured. We can only guess what. We see a room in disrepair, and in the back a door leading to another room trashed with clothes and furniture parts. A sign saying “The Lord Will Provide” hangs crookedly in the front. What is its meaning? It’s unclear.
Walker Evans has a fascination with architecture, showing the relationship between person and structure. In many photographs store and store owner become part of the entity. This is also the case with what may be Evans’s most famous photograph, the portrait of an unnamed Alabama Cotton Tenant Farmer Wife. The straight line of her mouth in grim determination becomes one with the straight lines of the building behind her. Many other photographs show houses slanted, as if the very infrastructure of American capitalism is buckling under pressure.
One key difference between Robert Frank and Walker Evans that benefits Evans is his key appreciation of what would now be considered “street art.” Torn and folded posters, elaborate and dilapidated murals, a row of advertisements along the street, and even graffiti are given equal attention to the houses and the people. It is a surprisingly progressive perspective, and one I don’t know if it has parallels in other media of the time (I would love to be proven wrong).
April 7, 2014
This is the 75th anniversary edition (2012) of the 1938 catalog that accompanied the Museum of Modern Art exhibition of photography by Walker Evans. While many of the technical aspects of photographic reproduction and of printing processes have evolved, this new edition faithfully follows the first edition, including the fine essay by Lincoln Kirstein, lifelong friend and enthusiastic patron of Evans. New to this edition are a Note on the history of the various editions and technical progress and Acknowledgments, which discusses the sources of prints assembled for this edition.
Taken over a ten-year period, the stark, haunting photos reveal an America at a troubled time, when uncertainty about the future haunted the land. Old, unsustainable ways were fading away and people didn't know if they'd find a place for themselves in whatever it was that was coming next. It's troubling to see the parallels between then and now, with a fading past and a threatening future.
Taken over a ten-year period, the stark, haunting photos reveal an America at a troubled time, when uncertainty about the future haunted the land. Old, unsustainable ways were fading away and people didn't know if they'd find a place for themselves in whatever it was that was coming next. It's troubling to see the parallels between then and now, with a fading past and a threatening future.
August 23, 2014
It's easy to see why this body of work was so influential but hard to believe someone had this kind of photographic vision as early as the mid-30s -- people are still creating images just like this. But somebody had to do it first, I suppose. Profoundly moving, yet impassive. The cliche "a picture is worth a thousand words" is a grotesque understatement when applied here. A thousand books, maybe.
November 29, 2007
Like I said, he was a genius.
January 26, 2013
Brilliant; one of the most compelling sets of American photographs. Good inspiration for black and white post-processing.
October 25, 2017
I often turn to study these photographs. Lincoln Kirstein's accompanying essay is a classic in its genre.
June 2, 2021
Colder and less immediately striking than Robert Frank's "The Americans", but no less singular and brilliant.
July 30, 2021
I became aware of Walker Evans after reading “Rules of Civility.” I recently read a blog post from Amor Towles and decided to hunt down more examples of Evans’ photography. This book of Evans’ pictures is a great look into the life of regular people in the late 1920s through early 40s. I found the book so interesting, afterward I dug into all the entries about Evans work I found on the Getty museum’s webpage. That foray down the rabbit hole took most of my day AFTER I finished this book. I can see why Towles found this man’s photos so inspirational. Evans captured moments that tease all sorts of stories in your mind. Fascinating stuff here. Frustrating not to know more real background of these “characters.”
February 17, 2023
Photograph 19 in Part One, titled "42nd St., 1929," has been privately renamed by me as "Beauty on 42nd." Never have I felt so compelled by a photograph to reach through it back in time to grasp what cannot be reached.
Read
February 14, 2024Another library photograph book. Some favorites include:
- Parked Car, 1932
- New York State Farm Int. ‘31
- Sidewalk in Vicksburg, MS ‘36
- New Orleans boarding house, ‘35
- South St. NY ‘32
- Hotel Porch, Saratoga Springs, ‘30
- Parked Car, 1932
- New York State Farm Int. ‘31
- Sidewalk in Vicksburg, MS ‘36
- New Orleans boarding house, ‘35
- South St. NY ‘32
- Hotel Porch, Saratoga Springs, ‘30
November 21, 2024
Certo, dato che è stato pubblicato nel '38 si capisce come tante fotografie siano alla base di un modo di vedere che ancora adesso è molto comune. Però tutta la seconda parte, vista con gli occhi moderni, è piuttosto noiosa e il suo principale interesse è documentaristico più che estetico.
June 21, 2025
Les portraits utilisent le regard caméra : tantôt méfiant, tantôt amusé, tantôt géné. Composition parfois ironique et utilisation de « cadres dans le cadre ». Enfin des photos de paysages, avec cet aspect neutre et documentaire, qui nous décrivent le paysage américain.
June 23, 2018
One of the collections that schooled my eye a half-century ago when I studied photojournalism.
October 6, 2020
Evans brilliantly captures the mistery of the American soul.
November 29, 2013
Love this. Features about 80 black-and-white photographs from the 1930's. Several are of people; almost all are candid. Many of the other photos are of homes or businesses.
Debuted in 1938. Republished by the Museum of Modern Art in 2012.
Here are captions from a few of the photos.
A Bench in the Bronx on Sunday, 1933
42nd St., 1929
Wooden Gothic House, Massachusetts, 1930
Sidewalk in Vicksburg, Mississippi, 1936
Garage in Southern City Outskirts, 1936
Arkansas Flood Refugee, 1937
Borrowed via intra-library loan thru my wonderful local library.
Debuted in 1938. Republished by the Museum of Modern Art in 2012.
Here are captions from a few of the photos.
A Bench in the Bronx on Sunday, 1933
42nd St., 1929
Wooden Gothic House, Massachusetts, 1930
Sidewalk in Vicksburg, Mississippi, 1936
Garage in Southern City Outskirts, 1936
Arkansas Flood Refugee, 1937
Borrowed via intra-library loan thru my wonderful local library.
December 4, 2014
Due serie di immagini collegate da un filo che è un piacere cercare di inseguire. Con eleganza, forza estetica e acume sociale, 20 anni prima di The Americans di Robert Frank questo libro rivoluzionario fonda le basi della fotografia come linguaggio artistico moderno, coerente, potente e innovativo. Quasi inedita per allora anche la disposizione di una sola foto a tutta pagina con la pagina a fronte bianca, e questa edizione è la riproduzione fedelissima dell'originale.
I saggi di accompagnamento sono pallidi a confronto del contenuto di cui parlano. Indispensabile.
I saggi di accompagnamento sono pallidi a confronto del contenuto di cui parlano. Indispensabile.
September 21, 2025
This reprint of the 1938 original is very well done, and seems to be true to the original intent. This is a book of photographs, there only a little text, and that's at the end. No frills or fluff, just Walker's work presented clean and clear.
March 1, 2014
there's nothing to say.
October 8, 2014
Beautiful prints, horrible essays.
November 19, 2014
A favorite - this edition is a great compendium of Walker's wonderful images.
July 20, 2015
I have spent countless hours in these photographs, and I will spend countless more.
January 15, 2021
Great photographs. New edition of original 1938 work.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews