Bettina Lockemann (eBook)

The Photobook

An Approach

The medium of photography seems particularly well suited for bringing together images in the context of images—and, therefore, also within the book. Books containing photographs have existed since the invention of photography. William Henry Fox Talbot (1800–1877) presented the positive-negative photographic process, which he had invented, in a book entitled The Pencil of Nature1 published in six fascicles from 1844 to 1846 and illustrated with original photographic prints. The reproducibility of the photographic images generated using the process he created made this possible. The daguerreotype process, introduced by François Arago (1786–1853) in 1839 predominated this period after having been made available unpatented by the French state; however, this early form of the medium had the distinct disadvantage of producing unique, non-printable copies. Daguerreotypes could only be reproduced through graphic adaptations, such as lithographs or engravings.2 While Talbot had to produce as many photographs as the number of copies published and individually glue these into each book, the invention of autotype printing—a halftone process based on photography developed in the eighteen-eighties—ultimately made it possible to print photographs and text simultaneously and in high volumes.

When Is a Book a Photobook?

Not every book that contains photographs is a photobook. It can be problematic to define and, therefore, differentiate between genuine photobooks and those which use photographs in a different way, such as illustratively. Interest in photobooks, which has increased since the beginning of the two-thousands, and the associated debate around this field have led to numerous attempts to define the photobook. These definitions frequently refer to the photobook anthology published by Martin Parr and Gerry Badger in 2004. The authors first of all describe the photobook as “a book—with or without text—where the work’s message is carried by photographs. It is a book authored by a photographer or by someone editing and sequencing the work of a photographer, or even a number of photographers.”3 This sweeping description, however, does not go far enough, so the authors try to provide a more detailed definition. The photographer (or the editor) is described as the author who, like a “director,” is responsible for the overall concept and the realization of the book.4 Several factors are crucial here: the photobook presents a theme that, to a greater or lesser extent, becomes clearly visible. The photobook does not present a collection of “greatest hits”5 or strong individual images by a photographer; rather, the content is cohesive and carried by the book’s overall concept, and thus also through factors such as the title, texts (if included), the design, the paper, and the printing quality.6 Parr and Badger describe the primary criteria of the photobook as follows: “that it should be an extended essay in photographs, and that it follows its theme with ‘intention, logic, continuity, climax, sense and perfection’…. The photobook, in short, is the ‘literary novel’ amongst photographic books.”7

Patrizia Di Bello and Shamoon Zamir rightly point out that in some of the works selected by Parr and Badger, it is not necessarily the photographs that carry the primary message of the book, thus emphasizing one of the problems of this definition.8 They assert, however, that the photographs in photobooks go beyond a pure illustration of the text: “image and text work within a dialectical relationship.”9

Mareike Stoll sees the photobook as:

the compilation of a series of photographic images in book form, and published by a publishing house…, which is framed by very little text and which lays claim to curatorial coherence within the book as a whole. Essential here is the photographic sequence, which, in addition, may be structured both linguistically and visually by the title of the photograph or page numbers, but is not reliant on these.10

However, Stoll centers her study of the photobooks of the Weimar Republic around the book 60 Fotos11 by Aenne Biermann, which is rather a compilation of ‘greatest hits,’ that is, of strong single images, according to Parr and Badger’s definition. As such, it does not comply with at least one of the criteria they consider essential to the definition of photobooks. Even according to Stoll’s definition—emphasizing the importance of the “photographic sequence”12—it cannot necessarily be classified as a photobook as it does not feature a coherent or thematically consistent succession of photographs. Additionally, Stoll’s emphasis on publication by a publishing house needs to be critically evaluated, for—both in the early stages of photography as well as today—many photographers self-publish their photobooks or, as has been the case more recently, use so-called self-publishing platforms.13 Once more I want to underline the importance of the coherence of the overall project as of its visual structure. The latter points on the one hand to the contextualization within the succession of images—Sweetman emphasizes the relation between “[t]he power of the single photograph and the effect of serial arrangements”14—which is more than a collection of single images. On the other hand, this involves not only typography and text but, in the first instance and unavoidably, aspects of design, such as the format of the book, the size of the photographs, the framing, and the arrangement of photographs across the double-page spreads.15

The concept of authorship introduced by Parr and Badger is often difficult to define unequivocally. This is because even when the photographer’s name alone is given on the cover, the photobook is usually the result of shared authorship.16 While the photographer provides the photographs, the selection of photographs or the determination of their order may be decided in collaboration with designers, curators, publishers, or editors. Although we may assume that the published book is in line with the ideas of the named author, other players are also involved. In particular, both the design and the texts influence the perception of the photographs in the book, but also the quality of the printing or the materiality of the paper affect the experience of reception.17

These definitions do not take into account the purpose of the book. Photobooks are produced with very different intentions and for various audiences. Travel books, company presentations, and propaganda books stand in opposition to photobooks as works of art. At the same time, photobooks that were once orientated towards a specific purpose may, at a different point in time, be regarded as art objects, because, for example, the photographers or designers also worked as artists, or because the original context of the publication has lost its relevance.18 In this context we can look at Jörg Colberg’s attempt to define the photobook who is using a rather pragmatic approach: “A photobook is a book that is being viewed because of the photographs inside.… Unlike most books, producing a photobook begins with the photographs; everything else, which might include copious amounts of text, is added later.”19 The purpose of the book is of no relevance to Colberg as the reception is carried out primarily because of the photographs and the production begins with them. Thus, the photographs are not accessory parts of other elements of the book as for example in cookbooks.20 Colberg thinks from the production side which is problematic for the classification of historic books when neither documents nor contemporary witnesses may provide information on the formation of the book.

There are overlaps between artistic photobooks and the category of artists’ books: “an artist’s book is a book created as an original work of art, rather than a reproduction of a pre-existing work.… [I]t integrates the formal means of its realization and production with its thematic or aesthetic issues.”21 The term ‘artist’s book’ can be applied to books that use photographs; but they are also produced by artists whose work is not exclusively photographic.22

The photobook, as it is to be understood here, is primarily photographic. It is thematically coherent and ties the photographs to the material parameters of the book as to layout, typography, texts, and paratexts to constitute a unity in form and content. This means it does not use photography as a medium through which to represent other artistic media—such as painting, installation, or performance.23 In its artistic form, the photobook may also be regarded as an artist’s book, as “art in the form of a book.”24 It combines photographic groups, series, and sequences to form a valid and mobile form beyond the temporal and spatial definition of exhibitions.

The Photobook in the Framework of Activity

The properties of the book in general suggest certain modes of usage. While text-based books usually function as containers for text that is read at the individual speed of the reader and in the specific order it is arranged in, photobooks—at least those conceived as artist’s books—can be used differently. As a visual book, the photobook enables the viewer to see its photographic content immediately, presenting her with a good deal of information upon first glance. Moreover,...