Before Photography: Painting and the Invention of Photography

Catalog for exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA, NYC) in 1981. Argues that photography was not a technical achievement without artistic roots. Rather it was born of the transformation in artistic outlook that, after centuries of experimentation, came to value pictures that seem to be caught by the eye rather than composed by the mind. The book also argues that photography was a legitimate child of the Western pictorial tradition. 152p, 82 plates (9 in color), 38 reference illustrations. Measures 10x8.5 inches.