The Pleasures of Good Photographs: EssaysIf looking at photographs is a pleasurable activity, it is pleasurable in a complex, transformative, frequently unsettling sense. It is not pleasure unalloyed, for no profound pleasure is pure...Like many truly enriching pleasures...photography has its dark, troubling, even dangerous aspects. -Gerry Badger The Pleasures of Good Photographs is an intellectual and aesthetic excursion led by Gerry Badger, one of the field's eminent critics and popular writers and the author of more than a dozen books including both volumes of The Photobook: A History. In this new volume of essays, Badger offers insight into some of his favorite images, artists and themes, drawing upon nearly three decades of experience writing and thinking about photography. With deep discernment and a readable blend of scholarly finesse and wit, Badger elucidates works by dozens of photographers, from Dorothea Lange and Eugène Atget to Martin Parr, Luc Delahaye, Susan Lipper and Paul Graham. Among the broader topics discussed are the photobook, where Badger believes photography sings its loudest and most complex song, and Photoshop's role in art-making. An interlude at the heart of the book pairs the author's evocative meditations with nearly a dozen particular images. Alongside some of Badger's classics, The Pleasures of Good Photographs showcases primarily new essays, making it an important addition to the canon of photographic writing. |
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Page 40
... Hambourg . Under Szarkowski's tutorage , Hambourg's doctorial thesis unraveled the complicated system Atget had used to number and categorize his pictures . This unlocking of the " code " to Atget's working practices had been something ...
... Hambourg . Under Szarkowski's tutorage , Hambourg's doctorial thesis unraveled the complicated system Atget had used to number and categorize his pictures . This unlocking of the " code " to Atget's working practices had been something ...
Page 48
... Hambourg , " The Structure of the Work , ” in John Szarkowski and Maria Morris Hambourg , The Work of Atget , Vol . III ( see note 6 ) . Hambourg also drew upon her research to write a biography of Atget . Maria Morris Hambourg , " A ...
... Hambourg , " The Structure of the Work , ” in John Szarkowski and Maria Morris Hambourg , The Work of Atget , Vol . III ( see note 6 ) . Hambourg also drew upon her research to write a biography of Atget . Maria Morris Hambourg , " A ...
Page 59
... Hambourg , eds . , The Waking Dream : Photography's First Century ( New York : Metropolitan Museum of Art , 1993 ) , p . 339 . 8. Ibid . 9. Painter , Marcel Proust , p . 79 . 10 . See Maria Morris Hambourg , introduction to Paul Strand ...
... Hambourg , eds . , The Waking Dream : Photography's First Century ( New York : Metropolitan Museum of Art , 1993 ) , p . 339 . 8. Ibid . 9. Painter , Marcel Proust , p . 79 . 10 . See Maria Morris Hambourg , introduction to Paul Strand ...
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aesthetic American Photographs Andreas Gursky Anna Fox Anthony Hernandez Aperture appeared Arbus artist auteur British certainly Cézanne color complex Comtesse conceptual contemporary course critical cultural depicted documentary photographer elliptical narrative essay Eugène Atget Evans's exhibition feel film formal Fox's frame Friedlander Gallery Garry Winogrand Gerry Badger Grapevine Gursky Hambourg Ibid imagery important interesting issues John Gossage John Szarkowski kind Kirstein landscape Lewis Baltz London looking Magnum Martin Parr medium Modern Art modernist Museum of Modern object painting Paris Parr's particular Patrick Zachmann Paul Strand perhaps photobook photogra photographer's political portrait postmodern prints quiet photographer Richard Avedon Robert Adams seems sense sequence simply social Stephen Shore style subject matter Susan Lipper talk themes things Thomas Joshua Cooper tion tographers Topographics tradition unpaginated view camera viewer visual Walker Evans writing York Zachmann