Customer Reviews

Robert Adams: Along Some Rivers: Photographs and Conversations

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Robert Adams is one of the most thoughtful people practicing photography today, and this book, though slim, is filled with conversations about the medium. Since purchasing the book about three months ago, I have read the book from cover to cover at least five times, and I suppose I will likely read it many times more. His words are full of love for photography and those who practice it, and for the landscape, and those who live there.

And the photographs--how does he find such simple scenes so full of memories of places I've never been? Full of light and leaves and water, quiet, powerful places...

Let me begin this review with a disclaimer, I am passionate about Robert Adams' photography and his writings and have been for over 15 years.

This book is in my opinion a useful primer for those interested in the ideas surrounding Mr Adams' work. A handy reference to other art and artists who Mr Adams feels are accomplished and successful in their approach to art. He also alludes to the meaning and function of art, a refreshing attitude in this post modern world of "anything goes".

However if you are looking for some intellectual meat or long indepth discourses on the meaning of art this book is not for you.

Currently this book is nestled in my bag and travels everywhere with me, shortly it will be as dog eared as his other tomes, Beauty in Photography: Essays in Defence of Traditional Values and Why People Photograph

Robert Adams' essays in "Beauty in Photography" and "Why People Photograph" were interesting and insightful. The interview text in this small book of photographs shows him to be an academic, lacking an understanding of human motivation and necessary practicalities. Would that the world was so simple. It's not and the foundation for Adams' wonderful photography is shown to be seriously flawed.

He describes himself in this book as being a socialist of sorts but then admits to having anger directed toward the "lower classes" because this "lower class" accepts "mass produced junk" without criticism. He also comes off as a sort of wimp. He may not return to photograph in California because of the "danger" he sensed in the areas he photographed. Apparently he feels that the presence of junk and the distant sounds of dirt bikes and "assault rifles" frightened him. I wasn't aware an "assault rifle" made its own unique sound. I wasn't aware that junk and dirt bikes were threatening. He also sensed "hostility" in many of the neighborhoods he saw because there was razor wire and aggressive breeds of dogs present. He later admits he has never been attacked while photographing but he has had to endure other people's anger. This poor guy must have either a superb sense of impending danger or he lives a sheltered, terrified life.

He answers many of the questions with quotes from famous people, whose words he has committed to memory. They are mostly profound statements. Unfortunately, when Adams speaks for himself, he comes across as lacking. He probably should get out among the "lower classes" more often and experience their hopes, aspirations and motivations instead of locking himself into a fantasy world of denial.

The photographs, however, are poetic and the only reason to buy this slim volume.