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A Place for Books?

johnastovall

Deceased, but remembered fondly here...
I suffer from the 'gentle madness', Bibliomaina. There are about 3000+ books (672 linear feet of them) in our house. Many are on art and photography. I'm not talking about '20 Cute Pet Tricks in Photoshop" but folios by interesting photographers, serious studies in technique such as 'The Photograph' by Mante and critical works by the likes of Sontag and Barthes.

I would like to suggest maybe we have a forum here where people can post information on books they have found important to shaping their eye or mind in this shadow land of photography.
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
Well, how about starting right here in this thread and if it takes off, we can either stick it or give it its own section?
 

mwalker

Subscriber Member
I just bought "Bystander" a history in street photography by Colin Westerbeck and Joel Meyerowitz. It coves all the masters and their technique. Most of them studied painting and talk about the technical aspects of it. I'm interested in that as well, and how it can relate to photography. Can you recommend a book on the technical aspects of painting i.e..proportional mean, the square within the rectangle, Golden rule...ect?
 

TRSmith

Subscriber Member
Can you recommend a book on the technical aspects of painting i.e..proportional mean, the square within the rectangle, Golden rule...ect?
Thanks for reminding me I have this! Time to read it again. "Geometry of Design, Studies in Proportion and Composition" by Kimberly Elam. Golden Sections, Divine Proportion, Fabonacci Sequence, etc. explained and illustrated very well.


Tim
 

johnastovall

Deceased, but remembered fondly here...
"Having learned th elements and principles of constructing a picture and its color design, one has the background also to make qualitative judgements about and criticisms of images. A pictures's design elements and color contrasts can be identified and explained analytically and used to evaluate the quality of the composition.....Knowing the grammar of art equips one to evaluate the qualities of an image or to produce images of high quality."

The Photograph Compostion and Color Design

Harald Mante

I first heard of Mante's book here and pre-ordered it from Amazon. I've had it two weeks and it is outstanding.

Mante provides a common language for understanding the elements of design in our photographs. This is becoming to me one of those books I keep going back to all the time.

Highly recommended.
 
M

matmcdermott

Guest
. Can you recommend a book on the technical aspects of painting i.e..proportional mean, the square within the rectangle, Golden rule...ect?
There's a book called Sacred Geometry which I have that goes in probably more detail than is needed for the artist about all of this. Not so much about art specifically but about the math beyond shapes and proportions that have been pleasing throughout the ages, why they seem to endure, their relationship to the human body, how they've been applied to architecture, etc.
 

johnastovall

Deceased, but remembered fondly here...
The Nature of Photography by Stephen Shore (Phaidon, 2007)

Stephen Shore has with "The Nature of Photography" followed the path started by John Szarkowski's "The Photographer's Eye" but 'gone beyound Szarkowski in to a new land. Where Szarkowski shows how to look at photographs with a curatorial and art historian's perspective, Shore gives us the vision and understanding from the photographer and teacher.

Shore uses images from all times and genres by both known and unknown photographers to show us how to read at the grammar of images. Shore's format is with a picture on the left page and short almost mediative pieces on the point it illustates to the right page. The book is composed of five sections. Each section is designed to take you deeper into the grammar of images. The sections are "The Nature of Photographs", "The Physical Level", "The Depictive Level", "The Mental Level", and "Mental Modeling."

This as with all great books on photography isn't about how to do it but how to see, think, and have vision. I found almost Koan like exploration of the image by Shore very attractive. You can keep coming back to this book and finding it still new. You don't have to follow a linear narrative so much as just dive in where you wish.

This is a book those times you need to refresh your eye and mind.
 
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