Martin Parr's Best Books of the Decade: the list.

PhotoIreland

PhotoIreland Festival announces Martin Parr’s selection of the 30 most influential photobooks of the last decade. The selection, on show at the National Photographic Archive of Ireland until the 31st of July, is featured in the exhibition catalogue, limited to an edition of 500.

The catalogue includes Martin Parr’s comments on each book, together with illustrations and ‘Author’s notes’. These are mostly unpublished texts by the photographers, publishers and curators of the works – personal statements on the process and raison d’être of each book.

We feel incredibly lucky and proud that of this our first publication, that will certainly attract a lot of international attention to Ireland.

If you have the chance, go and see the exhibition, it is unique, and it is free.

http://2011.photoireland.org/news/martin-parrs-best-books-of-the-decade/

thebaz

where is the Americans ? - just had a quick peruse , so i assume i overlooked it somewhere !

edit - oh - just realised its over the past decade - my favourite photo book , by a few miles :-)

sineadw

@theBaz I was at the talk last week. Parr did a run down of about 20 books that he considered the most important of all time before he hit the last decade. Although he did mention The Americans, it was more in reference to William Klein's New York, and how it was a more influential work than Frank's. I'll admit I don't know it very well, will have to remedy that next time I have a bit to spend on Amazon. It was a very interesting talk though. Pity you missed it.

thebaz

I'm no academic - but what i love about the Americans , is you can keep perusing and it never fails to inspire - i find its imperfections is what makes it work on so many levels - bit like early ramones/clash records

PhotoIreland

@thebaz remember that Robert Frank 'The Americans' was published on 1958 and that his personal selection of the most important photobooks relates only to the last decade, meaning 2000-2010.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Frank#The_Americans

I saw a great exhibition by Steidel in Paris Photo that included 'The Americans': http://pix.ie/bohoe/2035125/in/album/348453

I believe nobody forgets how important his book is!

thebaz

PhotoIreland wrote: »

@thebaz remember that Robert Frank 'The Americans' was published on 1958 and that his personal selection of the most important photobooks relates only to the last decade, meaning 2000-2010.

yeah - i realised , after i posted it was for past decade - apologies - Robert Frank is possibly my favourite photographer of all time - based on this book alone - so i'm very protective:D

EyeBlinks

Great exhibition and worth spending a bit of time there. Of the books on display (i.e. to be read) my own favorites were

Simon Roberts - We English (had seen bits of it before) - Bought It
Nina Korohnen - Anna - Fantastic - will buy this one too
Alex Soth - Sleeping by the Mississippi (had seen most of it before)
Susan Meiselas - In History


Didn't expect to like Nein Onkel (Nazi war snaps) but it was rather wonderful, engaging and shocking. Brilliant!

Effects

I liked Nein Onkel too. That was one of the things Parr talked about. That great photo books can be made up of other peoples photos, with that book as an example.