I recently ran a report to see which of the photography theory books are most frequently borrowed from the library. The following list shows the top twenty for the previous two years. Camera lucida came top.
See all the books (in A-Z order) on Library Search here.
Family snaps : the meaning of domestic photography
Jo Spence; Patricia Holland
London : Virago 1991
Photography theory
James Elkins
London : Routledge 2007
The art of interruption : realism, photography, and the everyday
John Roberts (John Charles)
Manchester; New York : Manchester Universtiy Press 1998
Light matters : writings on photography
Vicki Goldberg
New York : Aperture 2005
The photograph as contemporary art
Charlotte Cotton
London : Thames & Hudson c2004
Why photography matters as art as never before
Michael Fried
New Haven : Yale University Press 2008
Spectral evidence : the photography of trauma
Ulrich Baer
Cambridge, Mass. ; London : MIT 2002
The spoken image : photography and language
Clive Scott
London : Reaktion 1999
Over exposed : essays on contemporary photography
Carol Squiers
New York : New Press 1999
Photography and cinema
David Campany
London : Reaktion 2008
Stillness and time : photography and the moving image
David Green; Joanna Lowry
Brighton : Photoworks / Photoforum 2006
Photography : the key concepts
David Bate
Oxford : Berg 2009
The cinematic
David Campany
London : Whitechapel ; Cambridge, Mass. : MIT Press 2007
On photography
Susan Sontag 1933-2004
London : Penguin 2002
Art and photography
David Campany
London : Phaidon 2003
Photography : a critical introduction
Liz Wells 1948-
4th ed. London : Routledge 2009
The burden of representation : essays on photographies and histories
John Tagg
Minneapolis, Minn. : University of Minnesota Press 1993
The photography reader
Liz Wells
London : Routledge 2003
Thinking photography
Victor Burgin
London : Macmillan 1982
Camera lucida : reflections on photography
Roland Barthes
London : Vintage 1993, 1981
