This is not the book, you’ll take to beach and SPF’d and sandy.
You will want to sit down with a nice cool drink, and begin to pore through the pages of this new publication from the Getty Museum.
Maybe a quite afternoon on a porch, or in your favorite reading spot.
It’s not the feel good story of the summer, but a thoughtful, powerful one.
Engaged Observers: Independent Photojournalism, 1962-2007
is meant as a catalog to the current exhibition at the Getty, but it is more of a companion piece and has the strength to stand on it’s own.

From the Getty Store description:
“In the decades following World War II, an independently minded, critically engaged form of photography began to flourish. Situated between journalism and art, its practitioners created extended photographic essays that delve deeply into subjects and present distinct personal visions of the world. Engaged Observers: Documentary Photography Since the Sixties looks in depth at projects by a selection of the most vital figures who have contributed to this documentary approach. Passionately committed to their subjects, these photographers captured both meditative and searing images, from the Deep South in the civil rights era, to the war in Iraq, to the contemporary scene of American popular culture. Disseminated beyond traditional media outlets, their evocative bodies of pictures transcend the realm of traditional photojournalism.

Engaged Observers begins with an essay that follows the development of socially aware photography, setting work since the 1960s within a rich tradition that extends back to the nineteenth century. Surveyed in depth in subsequent pages are Leonard Freed’s Black in White America project (released around 1968), Philip Jones Griffiths’s Vietnam Inc. (1971), W. Eugene and Aileen M. Smith’s Minamata (1975), Susan Meiselas’s Nicaragua, June 1978-July 1979 (1981), Mary Ellen Mark’s Streetwise (1988), Lauren Greenfield’s Fast Forward: Growing Up in the Shadow of Hollywood (1997) and Girl Culture (2002), Larry Towell’s The Mennonites (2000), Sebastião Salgado’s Migrations: Humanity in Transition (2000), and James Nachtwey’s The Sacrifice (2007). These powerful visual reports, often published as books, explore aspects of life that are sometimes difficult and troubling but are worthy of attention. Each section opens with a focused essay that grounds the project within its evolving historical context and the photographer’s larger body of work.”

Here’s the deal.
We love our photo books. Even if we have seen an exhibition multiple times, we always pick up the catalog.
You never know what you miss, and you always miss something.
This particular volume, has so much more depth in the writing than what the show could ever do.
You would never stand to read the material while cruising the gallery, nor should you.
That is one experience, and the book is another.
This book is no mere catalog. It is a solid, brilliant work unto itself.
So we felt that one of you may like to have a copy of it free, gratis, no charge, no obligation, money does not change hands,
We will just send it to one of you subscribers to our FREE Newsletter.
Why you may ask?
Because we like you. And if you are willing to go that extra mile and sign up for our short weekly photo world updates, then you should be rewarded.
Every week.
The only fair way is by a random drawing , so that’s how it happens.
Answer a very simple photo question each week to be eligible (question is in the NEWSLETTER), we use random.org to pick us a winner, and that’s is it.
The more people that enter tells us we may be on the right track in your interests.
Less people entering means we may be missing the mark a bit.
Yep, there is a reason to it all.
So thanks as always to those that sign up, and even if you don’t sign up, we are happy to have you here with us and on our various outlets:
Twitter, FaceBook, YouTube, and some more platforms coming up soon.
All the best.