The Photograph

by Graham Clarke

Overview

How do we read a photograph? In this rich and fascinating work, Graham Clarke gives a clear and incisive account of the photograph's historical development, and elucidates the insights of the most engaging thinkers on the subject, such as Roland Barthes and Susan Sontag. From the first misty "heliograph" taken by Joseph Nicephore Niepce in 1826 to the classic compositions of Cartier-Bresson and Alfred Steiglitz and the striking postmodern strategies of Robert Mapplethorpe, Clarke provides a groundbreaking examination of photography's main subject areas—landscape, the city, portraiture, the body, and reportage—as well as a detailed analysis of exemplary images in terms of their cultural and ideological contexts. With over 130 illustrations, The Photograph offers a series of discussions of major themes and genres providing an up-to-date introduction to the history of photography and creating a record of the most dazzling, penetrating, and pervasive images of our time.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780192842008
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	05/08/1997
Series:	Oxford History of Art
Pages:	248
Product dimensions:	9.40(w) x 6.62(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Graham Clarke, Reader in Literary and Image Studies at the University of Kent, Canterbury, serves on the advisory board of the journal, History of Photography. His recent publications include The Portrait in Photography and The American City: Literary & Cultural Perspectives.

Table of Contents

Introduction
Chapter 1: What is a Photograph?
Chapter 2: How Do We Read a Photograph?
Chapter 3: Photography and the Nineteenth Century
Chapter 4: Landscape in Photography
Chapter 5: The City in Photography
Chapter 6: The Portrait in Photography
Chapter 7: The Body in Photography
Chapter 8: Documentary Photography
Chapter 9: The Photograph as Fine Art
Chapter 10: The Photograph Manipulated
Chapter 11: The Cabinet of Infinite Curiosities
Notes
List of Illustrations
Bibliographic Essay
Timeline
Glossary
Index

Editorial Reviews

Clarke (literary and image studies, Univ. of Kent, Canterbury) contributes one of the first entries in a series of short texts now being published by Oxford that treat aspects of art history. A vast amount has been written about photography, its history, its practitioners and processes, its influences as an art medium, and its power as a documentary medium, and anyone hoping to write a succinct book on the subject is bound to come up short in one or more of these areas. This high-speed, wholly inadequate survey of photography's early years leaves out a sense of the process of discovering and extending photography's capabilities. The bulk of the subject-oriented chapters deal with photography of landscapes, cities, human forms, and events. Throughout, Clarke attempts to focus the discourse on how photographs convey their meaning. The reproduction quality is good, and the images selected from the 20th century are often quite provocative and memorable. An introductory text for large history of photography and general art history collections.Kathleen Collins, New York Transit Museum Archives, Brooklyn

Library Journal