Art Architecture Photography Books

Far more than one of those thick books with modern layout and strangely-cropped images (which is what it appears to be on first glance). This book is a great read (even though there is only text on 1 out of 5 pages) and documents in photographs and words how the Freitag bag was developed, adopted by the masses, and used. If you want to see a product and design philosphy that is beyond "green", this is a good place to start. Smart, very smart.

Southam's wonderful book of (mostly) large format images taken from multiple series has been one of the most stimulating of the medium I've yet come across. I think it was Fay Godwin (also from the UK) who first made me look at both the beauty and timelessness of the landscape and the detritus of habitation despoiling same. One can get too precious with the subjects considered worthy of an exposure. From the methods of the photographer as revealed herein, Southam is a painstaking master of the medium with a strong idea of what he's trying to convey. His images of rock falls and dew ponds are unquestionably beautiful and with great colour. But it's the "stories", the multiple approaches of aspect or over time that are most interesting here. With some thoughtful essays and excellent printing, this is a book worthy of consideration.

I think reviewers are too harsh on this book. I have been working with photography for 20 years. I am still a beginner, and so am always interested in why a picture works or not. Reading Ang's book has helped me go back to photos I've taken with a new eye. The process helps me think through why I took the picture and why it does or doesn't work for me. Having some technical data next to his photos helps me better understand why or how a similar attempt of my own might work better. As with any book on an art form, the goal is get you moving on your own project. I would reccomend this book for that. It's also an exploration of rules and their modest place in a process.

this book is not meant to be a reference book and i think
it's clearly stated in the introduction. it is pretty easy
to read and and it has some good simple suggestions that
inspire me to take some pictures. maybe it's too simple for
some people, but like Thelonious Monk said:
"simple ain't easy"..

I found many very good essays in this book. But some of the photographs accompany the essays are out of the topics. One thing, Tom use "too" much croping the pictures to make his statement. And thus make it less Tao.

While this book is filled with some pretty pictures, none of the actual writing contains any substance that will teach you anything about tao or photography. The author just keeps making analogies to yin and yang, most of the time not explaining what he means.

I guess that if your purpose if just a pretty book for the coffee table, this might do, but then again there are so many better choices in the same price range, such as Cartier-Bresson's "A Propos De Paris."

If you are really interested in tao and photography then check out the book by Cross & Shapiro with the same title as this one. If you're just interested in improving your photography, and not necessarily about tao, then check out "Learning to See Creatively" by Peterson.

Ang spends a lot of time talking about lenses, cameras, film, etc. and not much time talking about Tao. As a result the book is rather dated (especially comments like, "You can think of digital cameras as being a little like the fast-food of photography.") His photos are Camera Club OK, but leave you asking, "If this is what Tao did for Ang, does it have anything to offer me?" If you want an introduction to Tao and photography, buy Tao of Photography: Seeing Beyond Seeing by Philippe L. Gross, S.I. Shapiro.

This book illustrates, with some technical form, the artful, whimsical commercial signage of days past. If you're wistful or nostalgic about the wild neon and bright painted signage you saw or like from the golden ages of the fifties and sixties, this book is for you! It's chock full of signage, specs and discussions of the form and substance of fanciful advertising. I highly recommend it to anyone who loves the imagery found all along the Mother Road..and beyond!

Every once in awhile someone from the high culture descends into a part of the low culture, studies it, and comes up with interesting findings. That Lisa Mahar is from the high culture there can be no doubt for she has won numerous awards from AIA, NEA, the NYS council on the arts, etc. That she has come up with another subject of interest (her book on grain elevators being a classic) there can be no doubt. In this instance, a book about motel signs, she gathered from her vast collection (500+) of pictures and old post cards the most interesting motel signs on route 66. She culled the ones that showed best her ideas of the evolution, and development of motel signs in terms of form, materials, orientation, symbols, content, and context. When you finish reading her book, you'll recognize streamline from art deco and colonial from international styles. You will know the possible deep embedded meanings in angled forms, irregular shapes, abstract symbols (like the Holiday Inn signs with that shooting star) and the artistic significance of asymmetry. Some of these deep meanings are frightening, if true as claimed by her, especially the crowns, turrets, shields, arrows, and crests in the context in which they appeared, the 1965 Watts insurrection and the 1967 Newark rebellion. Once you have read and reviewed this book, you will never be able to just look at a road sign again. Instead you will think about them - who made them, when, why, and out of what, as well as the overt and covert meanings. Most importantly, you will think how the sign fits in and reflects the place, culture, and tenor of its time.

It is very possible that this book was actually written for me. As designer, it talks about nerdy things that I actually care about. Shapes, construction, and typography of signage.

Anyone interested in the history of roadside signs will learn much from this book, but what a chore it is to read it. The main text is in bright red type with minimal margins. Captions and diagrams are in black type (thankfully) but far too small to be read easily. In many diagrams the type is not only tiny but is also in all-caps, which might not be a problem if the diagrams weren't so wordy. Some of the photos are so small that we just have to assume that they illustrate the author's points.

I recommend the book because of its content, but be sure to get a good reading light and a magnifying glass to get the full benefit.

I'm a professional designer and one of my favorite books on the popular cultural environment is "Main Street to Miracle Mile" and I imagine many who seek reviews of this book would say the same. This is not the book for you.

First, the illustrations are small and often not helpful. The author is of a school of design communication that is thankfully fading rapidly, turning up increasingly in the remainder bins. Recall the last time you picked up a 90s era book on, say, deconstructionist architecture and were stupefied by page after page of arid photos and obscure diagrams. This book isn't as bad as most but it clearly comes from that same camp.

Second, her whole point is that signage is an indicator of social change. Like many schooled in modern French criticism (also turning up in remainder bins these days) she frequently asserts without proof, as if an elegant sentence is somehow enough. The example that most irritated me was her statement that in the 60s regal motifs in signage became popular as a result of racial tensions and a yearning for authoritarianism. Aside from the fact that regal motifs were widespread through much of the early 20th century--as even cursory research will reveal--the assertion is made without any real attempt to prove this outrageous point. My sense was that she was writing within an intellectual milieu, of a type that afflicted us all during the 90s, that simply accepted certain cultural issues, like racism, as givens that required no evidence even in their particulars. Not exactly what we called scholarship and now again call scholarship. The book has that preaching-to-the-choir quality that was all too common with socio-politicized academic publications. Thankfully, we seem to be growing out of that phase.

Rather than being useful book on signage in America (that book still needs to be written) or even a useful book on social and cultural change, this is more an Exhibit Z of 90s-era intellectual and academic style, a trendy, obscurantist, frequently sloppy, and sometimes strident style I believe future historians will not mention favorably. From what I do understand about French-school criticism, that's, ironically, what it's supposed to be, a reflection of its times.

EXCELLENT!!! I ordered several 24/7 books new and used.
Then ordered covers from the 24/7 web site with pictures of family members.
Many with old candid long forgotten pictures.
These were given to family members from Coast to Coast. Even though
I wasn't with my family for the holidays I was a hit at every gathering.
For the uniqueness and the thoughtfulness of the Gift.

Many garden books I use for reference. The Beckoning Path is a total aesthetic experience. The photography is some of the most stunning I have ever seen, incredible compositions of form and texture and color. When I open the book I enter into Ted Nierenberg's forest garden: I can smell the damp moss, hear the water coursing over rocks, feel the stillness of fallen snow. I have given away five copies of this book to gardening friends. I would give many more if I could find more copies, but it is now out of print. The garden, and the photographs of the garden, are poems written in leaves and water and bark.

I can't speak for the captions for the photographs in this book. However, I'm sure anyone looking to purchase this volume is mostly looking for a visual item anyway. I'm also betting that many people won't even bother to read many of the captions and will just enjoy browsing through all the great photographs.

Dorling Kindersley, the book's publisher, has a well deserved reputation for making books so fully illustrated that they've single handedly revolutationized the publishing industry, especially for reference, travel and history books.

This book, at over 1000 pages and probably even more illustrations, is a huge bargain now that it's out of print. Maybe at full retail one should balk at inadequate captions. But at these prices, this is a steal and makes a perfect gift for almost anyone, from pre-teens to adults of all ages.

As a foreigner, I found this book is very useful to get a broad review of American history and culture.

The pictures in this book are great. However the captions are wrong often enough to make the book dangerous as a resource for students of American history.

I'm a photographer and was pleasantly surprised by this beautiful book this past Christmas. It has some wonderful pictures from various decades, some brought tears to my eyes. Even my husband couldn't put it down...

America: A Celebration is a weighty display gathering over a thousand photos which capture the patriotism and peoples of America, from candid photos of individuals to everyday shots of people in cities across the country. Photos are from the Hulton Getty picture Collection and others, and provide a powerful visual examination of the nation.