The atomic age began at 5:30 a.m. on July 16, 1945, with the explosion of “the Gadget” at Trinity near Alamogordo, New Mexico. Prelude to the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which forced the capitulation of Japan and ended World War II, the Trinity test was the culmination of herculean efforts by scientists, civilians, and the military of the United States to tap the potential of the atom for a wartime emergency. If Nazi Germany could engineer the bomb first, an Allied victory against Hitler was all but lost. Historic Photos of the Manhattan Project is a look back at the epic struggle to build the world's first atomic bomb. Nearly 200 images in vivid black-and-white reveal the project as it unfolded, from its secretive origins at Oak Ridge, Hanford, and Los Alamos, to the day Americans celebrated triumph over the Axis powers with victory over Japan. A pinnacle moment in the history of the United States, the Manhattan Project's application of Einstein's famous equation E = MC2 shows, perhaps better than any other single endeavor, what can be achieved by human ingenuity when the citizens of a great nation are united in freedom against a fearsome and despotic foe.
A charismatic stage and screen actress. A model whose beauty inspired some of the most arresting images of the twentieth century. A visionary photographer. A revolutionary with deep commitments to communism. A woman whose life, loves, and death were controversial. Tina Modotti (1896-1942) was all of these. Her life was one of almost unimaginable glamor, scandal, and turmoil. This biography portrays Modotti accurately and fairly, cutting through the distortions of myth and rumor that surround her. Perhaps best known as the lover, model, and apprentice of American photographer Edward Weston, Modotti emerges in these pages as a complex woman, deeply passionate in her relationships as well as her art and politics.
Historian Letizia Argenteri examines an array of international historical documents and letters as she traces the path of Modotti's life and career through Italy, California, Mexico, Germany, Moscow, and Spain. Argenteri tells the dramatic story in full detail, casting light on the mysteries of Modotti's life and carefully placing her in the political and social milieu of her time. The many fascinating illustrations in this book further illuminate Modotti's life.
The history of photography in Mexico was a largely untold story until the 1994 publication of Olivier Debroise's Fuga Mexicana, un recorrido por la fotografía en México. Based on ten years' research in public and private photographic archives in Mexico, the United States, Guatemala, and Europe, Fuga Mexicana provided the first comprehensive survey of Mexican photography from the advent of the daguerreotype in 1839 to the present.
The Mexican Revolution of 1910-1920 is among the world's most visually documented revolutions. Coinciding with the birth of filmmaking and the increased mobility offered by the reflex camera, it received extraordinary coverage by photographers and cineastes—commercial and amateur, national and international. Many images of the Revolution remain iconic to this day—Francisco Villa galloping toward the camera; Villa lolling in the presidential chair next to Emiliano Zapata; and Zapata standing stolidly in charro raiment with a carbine in one hand and the other hand on a sword, to mention only a few. But the identities of those who created the thousands of extant images of the Mexican Revolution, and what their purposes were, remain a huge puzzle because photographers constantly plagiarized each other's images. In this pathfinding book, acclaimed photography historian John Mraz carries out a monumental analysis of photographs produced during the Mexican Revolution, focusing primarily on those made by Mexicans, in order to discover who took the images and why, to what ends, with what intentions, and for whom. He explores how photographers expressed their commitments visually, what aesthetic strategies they employed, and which identifications and identities they forged. Mraz demonstrates that, contrary to the myth that Agustín Víctor Casasola was "the photographer of the Revolution," there were many who covered the long civil war, including women. He shows that specific photographers can even be linked to the contending forces and reveals a pattern of commitment that has been little commented upon in previous studies (and completely unexplored in the photography of other revolutions).
“It’s unclear who first said, ‘The best camera in the world is the one in your hand,’ or words to that effect, but most of the photographs in this book are the result of having one, or sometimes two with me while on brief holidays or visiting people around Britain.” – Berris Conolly
Released today by Reporters Without Borders, Malick Sidibé, 100 Photos for Press Freedom celebrates the work of one of the most influential photographers of the twentieth century.
Through a selection of iconic images, the album revisits the vibrant world of Malick Sidibé, whose photographs captured the spirit of a generation coming of age in post-independence Mali.
In the winter of 2021, Luke Oppenheimer arrived in the Tien Shan mountains of central Kyrgyzstan with a straightforward assignment: document the wolves that prey on livestock in the remote shepherding village of Ottuk. Each year, wolves descend from the high ridges to kill dozens of horses and countless sheep. For families whose wealth is measured in hooves and wool, these losses are catastrophic. The men ride into the mountains during the harshest winter months to track and hunt the predators, navigating blizzards and subzero nights in defense of their herds.
Spanning more than a decade of journeys and visual discoveries, Stories Untold is the ambitious new publication by internationally acclaimed photographer Calla Fleischer, a traveler whose lens is guided as much by curiosity as by empathy. Expansive in both scale and spirit, the nearly 400-page volume gathers a rich tapestry of images that explore the subtleties of the human experience—from fleeting gestures in crowded streets to quiet, contemplative portraits that linger long after the page is turned.
The Inner Passage: An Untold Story of Black Resistance Along a Southern Waterway is a groundbreaking photographic and historical project by Charleston-based photographer Virginia McGee Richards, published by MIT Press in April 2026. The work uncovers a little-known chapter of American history, revealing a 300-mile network of colonial-era canals—called “cuts”—dug by enslaved people between the 17th and 18th centuries along the Atlantic coastline from Charleston, South Carolina to St. Augustine, Florida.
"Another Time, Another Place" is an homage to New York City in the 1980s, when it was raw, chaotic, and alive with possibility. Downtown Manhattan was a place where art, music, performance, and nightlife collided—igniting a cultural revolution that still echoes today.
Where Do I Go? is the newest photobook by Rania Matar, bringing together approximately 128 color portraits of young women living in Lebanon today. Released in the shadow of the fiftieth anniversary of the Lebanese Civil War, the book offers a meditation on life shaped by prolonged instability, without allowing conflict to dominate the narrative. Instead of foregrounding destruction, Matar centers creativity, dignity, and resilience, crafting a body of work that quietly insists on the complexity of everyday existence amid uncertainty.
Award-winning Palestinian photographer Ahmad Al-Bazz presents a groundbreaking new work, The Erasure of Palestine, the result of a three-year journey documenting the remnants of hundreds of Palestinian villages and towns depopulated and destroyed from 1948 to the present. Through his lens, Al-Bazz confronts history, memory, and contemporary occupation, offering a stark counter-narrative to the dominant historical record.
With Cockaigne, Austrian photographer Gregor Sailer directs his gaze toward the largely unseen machinery of contemporary food production. Drawing inspiration from the medieval legend of the “Land of Cockaigne” — a fantasy of limitless abundance — Sailer examines the very real systems, technologies, and infrastructures that underpin how food is produced, distributed, and controlled today. The book challenges readers to rethink ideas of nourishment, consumption, and collective responsibility.
