Best Memoirs of Famous Photographers

[shead]

I'm a reader and love a good memoir. Hit me up with your best books written by photographers, even biographies might be good. Thinking the old great photographers that I don't even know about yet.

Edward Weston, Ansel Adams? I'd read their thoughts. Who else?

 

[fgorga]

I, too, am a reader especially of biography and memoir.

Here are a few that I have enjoyed...

Sally Mann's Hold Still: A Memoir with Photographs

Ansel Adams, an autobiography

Ansel Adams: A Biography by Mary Street Alinder

Two more, not photographers, but still worth reading...

George Eastman, A Biography by Elizabeth Brayer

Insisting On the Impossible : The Life of Edwin Land by Victor K. McElheny

 

[Don_ih]

@Alex Benjamin can probably give you a pretty extensive list.

I prefer photo books to biographies - although I like documentaries on photographers.

 

[juan]

Don’t forget Edward Weston’s Daybooks and the writing of Charis.

 

[Willy T]

American Witness: The Life and Art of Robert Frank, RJ Smith

​

 

[warden]

Berenice Abbott: A Life in Photography is a biography rather than a memoir but worth a look anyway.
Patti Smith: Just Kids is a wonderful book about her early life with Robert Mapplethorpe in NYC.

 

[snusmumriken]

The only autobiography I have is:
Bert Hardy: My Life, by Bert Hardy

The following are biographies, but I have enjoyed all of them:
James Ravilious: a life, by Robin Ravilious
Frank Meadow Sutcliffe, by Michael Haley (includes quite a lot of wryly humorous autobiographical passages by Sutcliffe)
Vivian Maier Developed, by Ann Marks

This is of course a very English selection!

 

[cowanw]

Eye To I – 1999​

by Erwin Blumenfeld (Author)

 

[Alex Benjamin]

Not that many autobiographies, for obvious reasons. While other arts are turned inwards, photography is, with a few exceptions, entirely turned outwards. This means that for the photographers the work is the autobiography—what they saw, who they saw, what they felt. What's left, when turned into words, often becomes mostly anecdotal, which is the case, for example, with the Ansel Adams autobiography (sarcastic minds will state that most of his photography is also anecdotal, but that's for another thread ).

That said, there are some worth reading. Top on my list is Gordon Parks' A Choice of Weapons, one of the most powerful autobiography you'll ever read. Ends early in his life—he followed that with To Smile in Autumn—but it's entirely worth it. I have Don McCullin's Unreasonable Behaviour on my bookshelf. People have told me good things about it, but, again, I haven't had time to read it yet.

Danny Lyon is an immensely interesting photographer that isn't mentioned enough. His essays are somewhat in between being about biography and about photography. They are collected in American Blood: Selected Essays.

Biographies of photographers aren't that common either. On Cartier-Bresson, Pierre Assouline's Cartier-Bresson: L'oeil du siècle and, not exactly biographical, Henri Cartier-Bresson: Interviews and Conversations 1951-1998, published by Aperture. Both are worth reading, but also quite frustrating, for different reasons, if you want to actually learn something about him. The already mentioned American Witness: The Life and Art of Robert Frank is good. A couple of biographies that are waiting on my bookshelf for me to have time reading them—can't wait for retirement—are Paul Delany's Bill Brandt: A life, James R. Mellow's Walker Evans, Arthur Lubow's Diane Arbus: Portrait of a photographer, Milton Metzer's Dorothea Lange: A Photographer's Life and Linda Gordon's Dorothea Lange: A Life Beyond Limits. Also on my list, but further back: George Rodger: An Adventure in Photography. I don't have W. Eugene Smith: Shadow and Substance, The Life and Work of an American Photographer. It's on my to buy list, but haven't had anyone recommend it (any body here read it?).

David Goldblatt's The Last Interview is excellent, but not exactly in biographical or autobiographical format.

For a mix of biography and photographs in the same book, a couple of notable ones that I went through recently: Sam Stephenson's The Jazz Loft Project: Photographs and Tapes of W. Eugene Smith from 821 Sixth Avenue 1957-1965, and The Life and Works of Sid Grossman by Keith F. Davis. Regarding Gene Smith, best biographical work remains the documentary The Jazz Loft According to W. Eugene Smith, just as All Things are Photographable is the best biographical work about Garry Winogrand.

I still think photographers most eloquent when writing on photography — "on looking" would be a better way to state it. Books by Stephen Shore, Robert Adams and Tod Papageorge to me are essential reading for anyone interested in photography.

Two photographers who mix well writing and photography in the same book, in a somewhat autobiographical manner—in the sense "this is what I saw"—, albeit in very different ways, are Teju Cole and Raymond Depardon. Depardon is interesting in that he harks back to a 19th-century style of travel writing, without the colonial undertones, of course.

As far as non-photographers writing about photographers and photography in a non-theoretical manner, Geoff Dyer's The Ongoing Moment is a fantastic read.

Some photographers about whom I wish there was either biography or autobiography in English or in French: Josef Koudelka, Ernest Cole and Josef Sudek.

 

[warden]

Not that many autobiographies, for obvious reasons. While other arts are turned inwards, photography is, with a few exceptions, entirely turned outwards. This means that for the photographers the work is the autobiography—what they saw, who they saw, what they felt. What's left, when turned into words, often becomes mostly anecdotal, which is the case, for example, with the Ansel Adams autobiography (sarcastic minds will state that most of his photography is also anecdotal, but that's for another thread ).

That said, there are some worth reading. Top on my list is Gordon Parks' A Choice of Weapons, one of the most powerful autobiography you'll ever read. Ends early in his life—he followed that with To Smile in Autumn—but it's entirely worth it. I have Don McCullin's Unreasonable Behaviour on my bookshelf. People have told me good things about it, but, again, I haven't had time to read it yet.

Danny Lyon is an immensely interesting photographer that isn't mentioned enough. His essays are somewhat in between being about biography and about photography. They are collected in American Blood: Selected Essays.

Biographies of photographers aren't that common either. On Cartier-Bresson, Pierre Assouline's Cartier-Bresson: L'oeil du siècle and, not exactly biographical, Henri Cartier-Bresson: Interviews and Conversations 1951-1998, published by Aperture. Both are worth reading, but also quite frustrating, for different reasons, if you want to actually learn something about him. The already mentioned American Witness: The Life and Art of Robert Frank is good. A couple of biographies that are waiting on my bookshelf for me to have time reading them—can't wait for retirement—are Paul Delany's Bill Brandt: A life, James R. Mellow's Walker Evans, Arthur Lubow's Diane Arbus: Portrait of a photographer, Milton Metzer's Dorothea Lange: A Photographer's Life and Linda Gordon's Dorothea Lange: A Life Beyond Limits. Also on my list, but further back: George Rodger: An Adventure in Photography. I don't have W. Eugene Smith: Shadow and Substance, The Life and Work of an American Photographer. It's on my to buy list, but haven't had anyone recommend it (any body here read it?).

David Goldblatt's The Last Interview is excellent, but not exactly in biographical or autobiographical format.

For a mix of biography and photographs in the same book, a couple of notable ones that I went through recently: Sam Stephenson's The Jazz Loft Project: Photographs and Tapes of W. Eugene Smith from 821 Sixth Avenue 1957-1965, and The Life and Works of Sid Grossman by Keith F. Davis. Regarding Gene Smith, best biographical work remains the documentary The Jazz Loft According to W. Eugene Smith, just as All Things are Photographable is the best biographical work about Garry Winogrand.

I still think photographers most eloquent when writing on photography — "on looking" would be a better way to state it. Books by Stephen Shore, Robert Adams and Tod Papageorge to me are essential reading for anyone interested in photography.

Two photographers who mix well writing and photography in the same book, in a somewhat autobiographical manner—in the sense "this is what I saw"—, albeit in very different ways, are Teju Cole and Raymond Depardon. Depardon is interesting in that he harks back to a 19th-century style of travel writing, without the colonial undertones, of course.

As far as non-photographers writing about photographers and photography in a non-theoretical manner, Geoff Dyer's The Ongoing Moment is a fantastic read.

Some photographers about whom I wish there was either biography or autobiography in English or in French: Josef Koudelka, Ernest Cole and Josef Sudek.

Fully agree about the Jazz Loft documentary and book. I have Shadow and Substance here but didn't get far before losing interest. Maybe I'll try again some day but 600 pages of Gene Smith is a lot. It may be too well researched. ;-)


"Some photographers about whom I wish there was either biography or autobiography in English or in French: Josef Koudelka, Ernest Cole and Josef Sudek."

That could be an engaging thread on its own. I'd like to know more about Pentti Sammallahti and Fan Ho.

 

[wattda]

I just finished Flash: The Making of Weegee By Christopher Borannos. Interesting to see how he hustled and created himself and myth. I can also second Just Kids Patti Smith for the same reason.

 

[Alex Benjamin]

That could be an engaging thread on its own.

Started one on a similar subject last year. Sammallahti was mentioned (a discovery for me).

Photographers I wish I knew more about

Title is self-explanatory. For now (more will surely be added): - Tod Papageorge: had Passing through Eden in my hand once in a used bookstore. Had other stuff to buy so passed on it. I regret it now. Papageorge's writings are brilliant and insightful: Tod Papageorge on Robert Adams - Louis...

www.photrio.com

I also wish I knew more about Fan Ho. Not only is there very little information about him, but his photo books are prohibitively expensive.

Speaking of Asian photographers, I didn't put Daido Moriyama's How I take photographs on my list. It's not really autobiographical and, to tell the truth, I was a bit underwhelmed by it.

I'm sure there must be good biographies about him, Shomei Tomatsu or Eikoh Hosoe in Japanese. Being the avid collector that I am, I wouldn't mind getting hold of one, even though I can't understand a single word of the language...

 

[shead]

Thank you for the wealth of info. I know little about photography beyond a few big names. Took photography in college as part of a design degree and my art history degree focused more on painters and little on photographers. This is my effort to get more informed. Grateful to all.

 

[warden]

Started one on a similar subject last year. Sammallahti was mentioned (a discovery for me).

oh geez, I see that I responded to that thread too with almost exactly the same response that I came up with here. Memory is a terrible thing.

 

[Rolleiflexible]

As far as non-photographers writing about photographers and photography in a non-theoretical manner, Geoff Dyer's The Ongoing Moment is a fantastic read.

Totally agree -- Dyer is an extraordinary (and somewhat eccentric) critic who connects dots that seem obvious in retrospect. Dyer wrote a second book on the subject, "See/Saw: Looking at Photographs," that I have on my shelf waiting to be read.

 

[Alex Benjamin]

Totally agree -- Dyer is an extraordinary (and somewhat eccentric) critic who connects dots that seem obvious in retrospect. Dyer wrote a second book on the subject, "See/Saw: Looking at Photographs," that I have on my shelf waiting to be read.

See/Saw is indeed excellent and illuminating, even though, being a collection of short essays that appeared in various places throughout the years, it doesn't have the original unity that The Ongoing Moment has.

I really like Dyer. For those into jazz, his But Beautiful (A Book About Jazz) is also a great read, an off-the-beaten-path way of approaching the genre.

Speaking of "of the beaten path", forgot to mention Sam Stephenson's Gene Smith's Sink: A Wide-Angle View. Mixes biographical elements of Smith's life with that of the jazz musicians that surrounded him in an original, informative and entertaining manner.

Another weird object is Minor White: Rites and Passages. You have some photographs by White, a biographical essay written by James Baker Hall, and autobiographical elements with the addition of excerpts from White's diaries and letters. I'd say it's for Minor White devotees only, or for those wanting to dive in depth into the history of photography—Minor White, as teacher as well as founder and long-time editor of Aperture Magazine, was far from a minor figure (pun intended) in that history. I have it but rarely open it. His writings about photography, the spirituality that motivates his aesthetics, I just don't get, nor his later photography. He's sort of like the John Cage of photography, but even more way out there. Beautiful craftsman, though. Would love to see prints of his one day.

 

[Pieter12]

Totally agree -- Dyer is an extraordinary (and somewhat eccentric) critic who connects dots that seem obvious in retrospect. Dyer wrote a second book on the subject, "See/Saw: Looking at Photographs," that I have on my shelf waiting to be read.

Along those lines, Diana & Nikon by the late Janet Malcolm is an excellent read.

 

[sasah zib]

Modern Instances. The Craft of Photography. A Memoir.Stephen Shore

Remote Past a Memoir. 1951-1966. Photographs by Kikuji Kawada.

Leni Riefenstahl: A Memoir. her work as Hitler's top national film executive, in which capacity she produced Triumph of the Will and the classic Olympia, for which she is best known and most revered and reviled.

To Smile in Autumn. Gordon Parks

Being in Pictures. Joanne Leonard

Limelight. early 1950s Helen Gee opened the country's only independent photography gallery. An inspirational tale from the early days of an important curator's life.

Snapshot Poetics. Allen Ginsberg's Photographic Memoir of the Beat Era.

 

[Patrick Robert James]

The Daybooks by Weston is the real deal. In his own words and those words were what he was thinking every morning when he sat down to write. It is almost a shame that it was edited for content back in the day. I would love if an unedited volume came out some day.

Through Another Lens by Charis Wilson about her years with Edward Weston.

Self-Exposure by Ralph Gibson. It isn't really an autobiography in the regular sense but more a book of stories about his interactions with other people. Plus it contains a lot of great images that are amazingly well printed.

 

[PrairiePhotographer]

I enjoyed reading Shadow Catcher, which tells the life story of Edward Curtis, famous for photos of Native Americans. The book is written by Timothy Egan, who has won a Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award for other works.

 

[MarkS]

David Douglas Duncan's "Photo Nomad".

 

[Alex Benjamin]

Haven't read them, but adding these two titles from the Avedon thread, recommended by @Pieter12 , @sasah zib and @Arthurwg :

Norma Stevens, Avedon: Something Personal
Philip Gefter, What Becomes a Legend Most: The Biography of Richard Avedon

"Avedon 100" at the Gagosian in NYC / May 4 to June 24

From the website: Gagosian is pleased to announce Avedon 100, an exhibition to open on May 4, 2023, at 522 West 21st Street, New York, in celebration of the centenary of Richard Avedon’s birth. Almost 150 celebrated artists, designers, musicians, writers, curators, and fashion world...

www.photrio.com

 

[Pieter12]

Haven't read them, but adding these two titles from the Avedon thread, recommended by @Pieter12 , @sasah zib and @Arthurwg :

Norma Stevens, Avedon: Something Personal
Philip Gefter, What Becomes a Legend Most: The Biography of Richard Avedon

"Avedon 100" at the Gagosian in NYC / May 4 to June 24

From the website: Gagosian is pleased to announce Avedon 100, an exhibition to open on May 4, 2023, at 522 West 21st Street, New York, in celebration of the centenary of Richard Avedon’s birth. Almost 150 celebrated artists, designers, musicians, writers, curators, and fashion world...

www.photrio.com

There is also Gideon Lewin's Avedon: Behind the Scenes, but I don't think it is anywhere as good as the other two. Lewin was Avedon's long-time assistant and the Avedon Foundation tried to stop him from publishing the book, claiming copyright violations for many of the photos. They lost. The Foundation also tried to get Norma Steven's book pulled, but just need up getting more publicity and better sales for it.

I don't know if they have been mentioned yet, but the two (unauthorized) biographies of Diane Arbus are worth a read: Patricia Bosworth's and Arthur Lubow's. The authorized one is quite good, too, including pictures of her notes, and many photographs (since it is authorized): Diane Arbus Revelations.

 

[Mark J]

Although strictly it doesn't count as a specific memoir by any one photographer, everyone should try to read Paul Hill and Thomas Cooper's 'Dialogue with Photography' which was collected interviews with some of the greatest names in photography, around 1975 . The work was done deliberately at that time to capture the thoughts of many great names who were towards the end of their lives. The content is fascinating.

 

[Alex Benjamin]

Anybody read Alex Kershaw's Blood and Champagne: The Life and Times of Robert Capa ?

(Hate the title, BTW.)