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Photography Reborn: Image Making in the Digital Era (Abrams Studio)
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by Jonathan Lipkin
Sales Rank: 198356
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$10.38
At Amazon
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Paperback: 128 pages
Publisher: "Harry N. Abrams, Inc." November 1, 2005
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0810992442
ASIN: B0014JOKD4
Product Dimensions:
9.9 x 7.8 x 0.3 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
From Publishers Weekly
The digital photography revolution may have taken place somewhat secretively inside dark boxes-cameras and computers-but the impact of digital photography, which is the subject of photographer and educator Lipkin's thorough introduction to the medium, has yet to be fully realized. Since its invention, photography has been a tool to both authenticate and manipulate experience. It is precisely this paradox that has made the medium so intriguing for critics, historians, photographers and viewers. But photography has never been as untrustworthy as it is now, and, according to Lipkin, it has also never been as creative. In accessible prose, Lipkin illustrates how digital photography has expanded the medium's expressive potential, ultimately bringing it closer to painting. This new definition of photography is supported by illustrations that range from abstract to realist to fantastical, with an emphasis on more challenging, if not creepy, images. The inclusion of computer-generated, digital images that appear to be photographs, but are not, such as visual representations of subatomic structures and avatars, may seem unwarranted, but fit Lipkin's idea that photography's authority and meaning have radically changed. Lipkin takes some provocative and challenging stances, such as arguing that we have reverted to a 19th-century way of seeing with this new technology, making for an intriguing read.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
--This text refers to the
Paperback
edition.
Customer Reviews & Comments
This review is from: Photography Reborn: Image Making in the Digital Era (Abrams Studio) (Paperback)
Having recently read Susan Bright (Art Photography Now) and Charlotte Cotton (The Photograph As Contemporary Art), I can vouch that Lipkin avoids the deliberately opaque writing style his peers employ. And he seems to have some interesting ideas about how artists change with technology. Unfortunately those ideas are often buried in thematic blubber. Lipkin's chapters are amorphous, no clear idea emerging through. He never fully says what a chapter is and why the photos are tied in. For instance, many of the photos in "The Body Electric" would seem more tied to "Portraiture in the Digital Age", at least going by the names. It would seem that clear sentences and an insightful writer would ensure a good book. Unfortunately, the lack of a decent editor standing over Lipkin's shoulder, telling him to define his ideas, predominates. Still, you'll be exposed to 30 or so really great artists and some interesting points of view. One of his ideas--that Jennycam represented some major change in image-making and photography--was particularly annoying to me, as the accompanying J-cam images are artless and careless. Photography implies some vision sculpting an individual image; Jennicam was shapeless and random. That said, I appreciate Lipkin's provocation, here and elsewhere. The book concludes with a tedious and, again, poorly defined history of digital photography (at one point Lipkin says the first digital image was created in 1957; then later says "the earliest digital images ... actually preceded the growth of electronic communication", the phone having been widely known for 50 years earlier). Given a chance to tie his disparate chapters together, Lipkin unwisely skimps on his bread-and-butter (theory) and instead emphasizes mechanical processes.
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Photography Reborn: Image Making in the Digital Era (Abrams Studio)
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