A unique new history of contemporary photojournalism to mark the 50th anniversary of World Press Photo 'Things As They Are' tells the story of modern photojournalism, from The Family of Man and the heyday of Life magazine in 1955 to the era of the camera-phone in the present day. With 120 picture essays shown as they were first seen ? on the pages of newspapers and magazines, 'Things As They Are' reveals how the events of the world, the art of photographers, and the interests of the press have converged on the printed page. It traces how photojournalism has developed over time alongside changing technology, media, fashions in photography ? and a changing world.
Including landmark photo essays by photographers such as Richard Avedon, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Walker Evans, Nan Goldin, W Eugene Smith, Wolfgang Tillmans, Mary Ellen Mark, Sebastião Salgado and James Nachtwey, as shown on the pages of publications including Life, Paris Match, National Geographic, Stern, i-D and the Sunday Times, each is accompanied by an expert commentary. The book includes a introductory essay by Mary Panzer, a timeline of the last 50 years illustrated by the iconic winners of the annual World Press Photo awards, and an afterword essay by Christian Caujolle that looks to the future of photojournalism.

"Things As They Are" tells the story of modern photojournalism, from "The Family of Man" and the heyday of "Life" magazine in 1955 to the era of the camera-phone in the present day. With 120 picture essays shown as they were first seen - on the pages of newspapers and magazines, "Things As They Are" reveals how the events of the world, the art of photographers, and the interests of the press have converged on the printed page. It traces how photojournalism has developed over time alongside changing technology, media, fashions in photography - and a changing world. Including landmark photo essays by photographers, such as Richard Avedon, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Walker Evans, Nan Goldin, W Eugene Smith, Mary Ellen Mark and James Nachtwey, as shown on the pages of publications, including "Life", "Paris Match", "National Geographic", "Stern" and the "Sunday Times", each is accompanied by an expert commentary. The book includes a introductory essay by Mary Panzer, a timeline of the last 50 years illustrated by the iconic winners of the annual World Press Photo awards, and an afterword essay by Christian Caujolle that looks to the future of photojournalism.

Mary Panzer is a cultural historian who lives in New York. She worked as assistant director at the Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, before becoming curator of photographs at the National Portrait Gallery, in Washington DC, between 1992 and 2000. Her books include Mary Ellen Mark (1997), Matthew Brady and the Image of History (1997), Philippe Halsman: A Retrospective (1998) and Lewis Hine (2002). Panzer also writes on art and history for publications including American Photo, Art in America, Art on Paper, Chicago Tribune and Vanity Fair, and is currently working on a historical survey of Look magazine.
Christian Caujolle was born in France in 1953. From 1978, he worked as photography critic for Libération before becoming its director of photography in 1981. He is currently director of the influential Paris-based photo agency and gallery, Vu, which he created in 1986. Caujolle has worked as artistic director of international photography festivals, including Les Rencontres d?Arles in 1997, Rotterdam?s Foto Biennale in 2000 and Madrid?s Photo España in 2001, and he has contributed as editor and writer to books of photographs by Michael Ackerman, Peter Beard, William Klein, Jacques Henri Lartigue, Gisèle Freund and Sebastião Salgado, among many others.
World Press Photo is an independent, non-profit organization, committed to supporting and promoting the work of professional press photographers internationally. Founded in Amsterdam in 1955 in Amsterdam, it organises the world?s largest and most prestigious annual press photography contest, exhibiting the results in over 35 countries each year and with its yearbook published in X languages. It also contributes to the training and support of photojournalists with its annual Joop Swart Masterclass and with its programmes of international seminars (for instance, in 2005, in Armenia, Indonesia, Nigeria and Tanzania).

2008-04-05 A photo is worth a thou.....

I only recently came across this book and it was an especially wonderful find because of the editorial format. To reproduce the photos in the context of their spreads and pages was just right for me as I spent my life as a publication designer. Although it is celebration of the World Press Photo organization another of the book's strengths is the range of material, not just hard news images but feature photography, so Richard Avedon's 1968 psychedelic Beatles shots are here, a Diane Arbus set for Esquire in 1960 or a series of feet photos for Suddeutsche Zeitung, 2004.

Mary Panzer's introduction does a neat job of describing photojournalism from past decades and her captions for each photographer and publication are spot-on. As a designer I was interested to see how current affairs magazines handled photos and mostly they are left alone to tell their story though Paris Match has a habit of putting text on the photo but unfortunately in a rather un-designed way where as Stern do it in a much more considered way.

I thought the book a first class survey of journalism in past decades. A similar book is `Kiosk' (ISBN 9783882437911) by Robert LeBeck. It is a history of the genre from 1839 to 1973 and like `Things as they are' it shows photos as they originally appeared on covers and in the spreads inside.