VISION ANEW - The lens and screen arts, today

 

Photographer, educator and writer Adam Bell was kind enough to send me a copy of his new bookwork VISION ANEW. Edited by Bell and Charles H. Traub and published by the University of California Press, the work charts a path through the minefield of contemporary lens based practice where every day more than a billion images are made. The book is an essential read for any of us immersed in this chaotic world of over production.

Adam Bell says this: VISION ANEW broadens the discussion about what constitutes the lens-based arts, what they can do and their significance in the world... the lens arts are a slippery matrix for innumerable activities... constantly changing applications... force us to remain vigilant and mindful about the changing nature of the lens arts. The anxiety that accompanies this unstable ground gives rise to not only wild and fanciful speculation about the future but also dread-filled proclamations on the state of the medium.

And from the University of California Press: The ubiquity of digital images has profoundly changed the responsibilities and capabilities of anyone and everyone who uses them. Thanks to a range of innovations, from the convergence of moving and still image in the latest DSLR cameras to the growing potential of interactive and online photographic work, the lens and screen have emerged as central tools for many artists. Vision Anew brings together a diverse selection of texts by practitioners, critics, and scholars to explore the evolving nature of the lens-based arts. Presenting essays on photography and the moving image alongside engaging interviews with artists and filmmakers, Vision Anew offers an inspired assessment of the medium’s ongoing importance in the digital era. Contributors include Ai Weiwei, Gerry Badger, David Campany, Lev Manovich, Christian Marclay, László Moholy-Nagy, Walter Murch, Trevor Paglen, Pipilotti Rist, Shelly Silver, Rebecca Solnit, and Alec Soth, among others. This vital collection is essential reading for artists, educators, scholars, critics, and curators, and anyone who is passionate about the lens-based arts.

VISION ANEW is a must read for any of us making pictures. You can get a copy from UC Press HERE. And while you are at it you can go to Adam Bell's website HERE.