Photo Book Melbourne

“The term ‘photobook’ is recent. It hardly appears in writings and discussions before the twenty-first century. This is surprising given that some of the various kinds of objects it purports to designate have been around since the 1840s. It seems that makers and audiences of photographic books did not require the term to exist. Indeed they might have benefitted from its absence. Perhaps photographic book making was so rich and varied precisely because it was not conceptualized as a practice with a unified name? So does the advent of the term ‘photobook’ mark some kind of change?” David Campany

Starting from a short essay by David Campany: The ‘Photobook’: What’s in a name? and his earlier review of Martin Parr & Gerry Badger’s book ‘The Photobook: A History’ for Source magazine, this panel discussion will explore the term ‘photobook and various connected themes – editing, the essay, sequence, and the institutionalizing of the self-published photobook.

Campany closes his essay with this line – “And for all its various forms the photobook is a relatively tame object of study, compared to wild hall of mirrors that is the photograph online.”

This panel will discuss Campany’s standpoint and ‘provocation’ to examine the complexity of the contemporary photobook.

The panel will include:

Stacy Mehrfar (USA) – artist
Kristian Haggblom (AUS) – artist, curator
Simone Rosenbauer (GER) – artist, academic
Ying Ang (AUS) – artist
Patrick Pound (AUS) – artist, academic (Deakin University)
Daniel Palmer (AUS) – writer, academic (Monash University)
Anita Totha (NZ) – artist, curator (Photobook Club, Auckland)
Martyn Jolly (AUS) – writer, academic (ANU)
Isobel Parker Philip (AUS) – curator (AGNSW)

Chaired by Daniel Boetker-Smith

Limited spaces available. Make your booking now.

This venue is the same venue that is hosting the Paris Photo/Aperture Photobook Exhibition.