Books like Photography at the dock by Abigail Solomon-Godeau

John Berger’s *Ways of Seeing* explores how perception, language, and cultural context shape the way we interpret art and images, drawing on his 1972 BBC series to challenge conventional visual analysis.

Susan Sontag examines how images of war and violence shape our perception of suffering, questioning whether the visual spectacle desensitizes or incites us.

A seminal collection of essays by Susan Sontag that examines photography’s history, meaning and role in capitalist societies.

Paul Strand honors the centennial anniversary of the artist's birth, and also highlights the National Gallery's increased commitment to the art of photography as we approach the fiftieth anniversary of our founding. From the beginning we were clear that we wanted to celebrate both the development and range of Strand's art and also his remarkable craftsmanship. Strand was not only an artist, but, as he undoubtedly would want clearly stated, a photographer. It is for that reason that we are all the more pleased to welcome him into the Gallery. The exhibition is the work of Sarah Greenough, curator of photographs at the National Gallery. - Acknowledgements and Foreword.

Una nueva edición del mítico libro de John Szarkowski, que fue fotógrafo y director del departamento de fotografía del Museo de Arte Moderno (MoMA, por sus siglas en inglés) de Nueva York y autor de numerosos libros. *El ojo del fotógrafo* es una introducción al arte de la fotografía que reúne imágenes de respetados maestros y de fotógrafos desconocidos que surgió a partir de una exposición en 1964, y fue publicado por primera vez en 1966. El libro nos acerca al lenguaje fotográfico a través de la obra de grandes maestros como Avedon, Cartier-Bresson, Doisneau, Evans, Frank, Penn, Steichen, Strand o Weston. Investiga las características visuales de las fotografías y las razones que las explican, dividiendo las imágenes en cinco apartados, examinando las alternativas a las que se enfrenta el artista: la cosa en sí, el detalle, el marco, el tiempo y la posición aventajada. Se interesa por la tradición y el estilo fotográficos, con el sentido posibilista que el fotógrafo aplica hoy día a su trabajo. La invención de la fotografía trajo consigo un método de creación de imágenes radicalmente nuevo, basado en la selección y no en la síntesis. La diferencia básica es que las pinturas se crean, se construyen a raíz de un conjunto de esquemas, habilidades y actitudes tradicionales; las fotografías, sin embargo, se toman. Esta diferencia planteó un problema creativo de nueva índole: ¿cómo podría ese proceso mecánico y automático ofrecer imágenes significativas en términos humanos; imágenes dotadas de claridad, coherencia y perspectiva? Desde entonces, la historia de la fotografía no ha sido tanto un viaje como un crecimiento, que se ha propagado desde un epicentro penetrando en nuestra conciencia.

This is an account of the power relations that sustain and make possible photographic meanings, with special attention to photographs of Palestinian noncitizens of Israel and women in Western societies. "Azoulay argues that photography is a particular set of relations between individuals to the power that governs them, and, at the same time, a form of relations among equal individuals that constrains this power. Her book shows how anyone, even a stateless person, who addresses others through photographs or occupies the position of a photograph's addressee, is or can become a citizen in the citizenry of photography. The civil contract of photography enables him or her to share with others the claim made or addressed by the photograph. But the crucial arguments of the book concern two groups whose vulnerability and flawed citizenship have been rendered invisible due to their state of exception: the Palestinian noncitizens of Israel and women in Western societies. What they share is an exposure to injuries of various kinds and the impossibility of photographic statements of their plight from ever becoming claims of emergency and calls for protection. Thus one of her leading questions is the following: Under what legal, political or cultural conditions does it become possible to see and to show disaster that befalls those flawed citizens in states of exception? The book brilliantly examines key texts in the history of modern citizenship, such as the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, together with relevant works by Giorgio Agamben, Hannah Arendt, Olympe de Gouges, and Jean-Franç̧ois Lyotard; it rigorously analyzes Israeli photographs of violent episodes in the Occupied Territories--work by Miki Kratsman, Michal Heiman, and Aïm Deüelle Lüski--and it interpretively engages photographs of women from those of Muybridge to recent images from Abu Ghraib prison. At the same time Azoulay provides new critical perspectives on well-known texts such as Susan Sontag's Regarding the Pain of Others and Roland Barthes's Camera Lucida." -- Publisher's description.