The back cover of the book provides the following, which describes the book better than I possibly could:

This handsomely illustrated volume presents a fascinating pictorial and literary experience, bringing to life through their own words – and photographs – the scientists, artists, philosophers, innovators and entrepreneurs who in the last century (Note: the book was published in 1980) and a half have formulated a new art and a new era of communication.

Beaumont Newhall calls this book “an autobiography of the art of photography, written by some of the men and women who by their inventive genius, their scientific skill, and their artistic sensibility have forged a technique into a vital visual medium. We have allowed them to speak to us directly, without condensing, excerpting, or otherwise editing their words, so the volume may be both an authentic source book for students of the history of photography as an art and a narrative for the general reader”.

Mr. Newhall has chosen 190 photographs to illustrate the reports, criticism, and points of view expressed by the writers of the “autobiography,” many from the photographic archive of the Museum of Modern Art, others from collections throughout the world. He also provides brief introductory comments to place each selection in historical context. Photographs and text are carefully integrated.

The selections in this volume include first-person accounts of the inventions of the basic photographic techniques; newspaper reports of the discovery of the daguerreotype and of early photographic exhibitions; criticism by Baudelaire, Léger, Moholy-Nagy; personal statements from Stieglitz, Steichen, Strand, Lange, Adams, Weston, Evans and others. This basic source material, presented at length and accompanied by relevant photographs, provides a rich background for the chronological history of the medium so masterfully presented by Mr. Newhall in his classic work, The History of Photography.

To give a better sense of the scope of the work I’ve scanned the table of contents (see below)



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