Janet Malcolm takes nothing for granted. In complicated but lucid prose she sets out to change our perceptions of photographers and photography in this highly regarded volume, now in an expanded edition. She looks at Alfred Stieglitz's pioneering efforts on behalf of the medium as an art form, considers Edward Weston's "psychic journey" to Mexico, and reflects on how these men fared at the hands of recent biographers. Malcolm also examines misconceptions about Richard Avedon's fashion photography and analyzes the motives behind his often distressing celebrity portraits. In a new essay, she discusses the charges of exhibitionism leveled at the provocative work of Sally Mann.

From Library Journal
This expanded version of Malcolm's 1980 collection of essays on photography includes five new essays, greater use of photo images, and a new preface to supplement the original. Malcolm, a staff writer for The New Yorker and a talented photography critic, takes images for intellectual rides that sometimes end in surprising places. Still eager to analyze the snapshot style that emerged in the latter half of this century, Malcolm sees these works as art but closer to literature than they are to craft. The newest essays in this collection are by no means her strongest, but they do expand the value of this book by offering more of the connections that the writer makes so well, between the choices made by photographers, reality, the arts in general, and the essence of the visuals she probes. However, even with more images than the original edition, their relative scarcity remains a weakness. Still, this is recommended for photography collections.?David Bryant, New Canaan P.L., Ct.Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review
"Instead of accepting the usual assumptions, explanations, and dogmas, Malcolm looks for herself, sees everything from many sides. . . . There is no one who can articulate the process of thinking about photography the way Malcolm can."--Ingrid Sischy, editor, Interview

"Janet Malcolm is . . . perhaps the finest critic that the current photography boom has yet produced--and with this first book she easily takes her place among the most accomplished art critics now writing."--The New York Times Book Review

"Janet Malcolm's collection of essays must surely constitute one of the most thoughtful works ever to address the subject. Certainly, it is one of the most readable."--The Boston Globe

"Fascinating reading for anyone interested in the art of photography. A stimulating collection; an impressive book."--Mademoiselle


Review
"Instead of accepting the usual assumptions, explanations, and dogmas, Malcolm looks for herself, sees everything from many sides. . . . There is no one who can articulate the process of thinking about photography the way Malcolm can."--Ingrid Sischy, editor, Interview

"Janet Malcolm is . . . perhaps the finest critic that the current photography boom has yet produced--and with this first book she easily takes her place among the most accomplished art critics now writing."--The New York Times Book Review

"Janet Malcolm's collection of essays must surely constitute one of the most thoughtful works ever to address the subject. Certainly, it is one of the most readable."--The Boston Globe

"Fascinating reading for anyone interested in the art of photography. A stimulating collection; an impressive book."--Mademoiselle


Review
"Instead of accepting the usual assumptions, explanations, and dogmas, Malcolm looks for herself, sees everything from many sides. . . . There is no one who can articulate the process of thinking about photography the way Malcolm can."--Ingrid Sischy, editor, Interview

"Janet Malcolm is . . . perhaps the finest critic that the current photography boom has yet produced--and with this first book she easily takes her place among the most accomplished art critics now writing."--The New York Times Book Review

"Janet Malcolm's collection of essays must surely constitute one of the most thoughtful works ever to address the subject. Certainly, it is one of the most readable."--The Boston Globe

"Fascinating reading for anyone interested in the art of photography. A stimulating collection; an impressive book."--Mademoiselle


Book Description
This expanded edition of Diana & Nikon, Janet Malcolm's first book, presents new essays that explore the last work of Diane Arbus, Sally Mann's family pictures, E.J. Bellocq's famous 1912 nudes, Andrew Bush's richly detailed interiors, and the relationship between painting and photography. The text of the original edition--long a much sought after rarity--is reprinted here in full, including essays on the works of the masters Stieglitz, Steichen, and Weston, as well as contemporaries such as Robert Frank, Irving Penn, and William Eggleston.

Malcolm offers a view of photography that is as complicated and as controversial as the medium itself. Her writings on such topics as Richard Avedon's portraits, Garry Winogrand's street photographs, and Harry Callahan's color work exhibit the elegant prose style and incisive commentary for which she is renowned. Illustrated with 100 black-and-white photographs, this is a book to read and to ponder, a sensitive and generous appraisal of where photography stands in relation to all the arts, and to its own past, by one of the leading writers of her generation.


About the Author
Janet Malcolm is the author of In the Freud Archives, Psychoanalysis: The Impossible Profession, The Journalist and the Murderer, The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes, and The Purloined Clinic: Selected Writings. She has been a staff writer at the New Yorker since the 1960's. Born in Prague, Malcolm grew up in New York City where she lives with her husband.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

This expanded edition of Diana & Nikon, Janet Malcolm's first book, presents new essays that explore the last work of Diane Arbus, Sally Mann's family pictures, E. J. Bellocq's famous 1912 nudes, Andrew Bush's richly detailed interiors, and the relationship between painting and photography. The text of the original edition - long a much sought after rarity - is reprinted here in full, including essays on the works of the masters Stieglitz, Steichen, and Weston, as well as contemporaries such as Robert Frank, Irving Penn, and William Eggleston. Malcolm offers a view of photography that is as complicated and as controversial as the medium itself. Her writings on such topics as Richard Avedon's portraits, Garry Winogrand's street photographs, and Harry Callahan's color work exhibit the elegant prose style and incisive commentary for which she is renowned. Illustrated with 100 black-and-white photographs, this is a book to read and to ponder, a sensitive and generous appraisal of where photography stands in relation to all the arts, and to its own past, by one of the leading writers of her generation.

FROM THE CRITICS

Library Journal

This expanded version of Malcolm's 1980 collection of essays on photography includes five new essays, greater use of photo images, and a new preface to supplement the original. Malcolm, a staff writer for The New Yorker and a talented photography critic, takes images for intellectual rides that sometimes end in surprising places. Still eager to analyze the snapshot style that emerged in the latter half of this century, Malcolm sees these works as art but closer to literature than they are to craft. The newest essays in this collection are by no means her strongest, but they do expand the value of this book by offering more of the connections that the writer makes so well, between the choices made by photographers, reality, the arts in general, and the essence of the visuals she probes. However, even with more images than the original edition, their relative scarcity remains a weakness. Still, this is recommended for photography collections.David Bryant, New Canaan P.L., Ct.

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