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The Directorial Mode (1976)(b)

Willingly or no, whether or not they consider themselves “photographers” or “artists” or whatever, these individuals and many others are exploring the same field of ideas. That field of ideas is built into and springs from the medium of photography itself; it has a history and tradition of its own which is operative on many levels of our culture. […]

The Directorial Mode (1976)(a)

The substantial distinction, then, is between treating the external world as a given, to be altered only through photographic means (point of view, framing, printing, etc.) en route to the final image, or rather as raw material, to be itself manipulated as much as desired prior to the exposure of the negative. … […]

Guest Post 38: Blaise Tobia on CETA

During the Covid pandemic many people were calling for a “New WPA” to help alleviate the cultural crisis while, in fact, CETA was a more viable model. It had received bipartisan support in 1973, and was actually signed into law by Richard Nixon! […]

Sebastião Salgado (1944–2025): A Farewell

Salgado combines what Fred Ritchin calls a “stately lyricism” with an alertness to the drama embedded in the everydayness of hardscrabble subsistence, marginal survival and imminent death. […]

George Tice (1938-2025): A Farewell

Tice’s pictures sometimes include people, but their visible presence in the flesh is rarely central to his vision, which instead investigates a largely depopulated urban and rural environment, a set of physical structures rather than social interactions. To the extent that he concerns himself with the past and present inhabitants of these locales, he addresses them through what they have built there and the marks they have left behind, not through the activities and behaviors of the present-day citizenry. In that sense, his motive is more archaeological than sociological. […]