This year we are celebrating the 25th anniversary of our renowned listing of the year's best photobooks. To mark this milestone, we've decided to do something a bit different. We've asked 88 internationally recognized luminaries from the photobook world to choose their favorite photobook of the year. Their favorite book could be unforgettable for any number of reasons but the chosen books affected our selectors on a very personal level. These books led each of our contributors to conclude, "If there's one book not to miss this year, it would be this!"
Each day for the following two weeks we will publish additional titles selected by our distinguished group of photobook lovers. Subscribe to PhotoBookDaily to get our email announcements in advance!
Check back daily to see a new group of favorite books!
Daniel Shea's Favorite
Photographs by Stanley Wolukau-Wanambwa
"This text is simultaneously so deeply personal and so deeply theoretical, its exploration of the meaning and consequences of race, that its implications can’t be ignored; we need to constantly be pressing to resist longstanding realities. We need to resist the comfort and delusion that maintains a status quo."
John Jenkins's Favorite
Photographs by Monica Alcazar-Duarte
"What I like about The New Colonists is the way in which it interweaves two separate yet conceptually intertwined bodies of work. The first presents photographs of Mars, Pennsylvania. They depict life in a small rural American town — a high school football game, the local pizza shop, the county fair, etc."
Tomoki Matsumoto's Favorite
Photographs by Max Pinckers
"I have been following Max’s works, and Margins of Excess is my favorite. Very strong book with wonderful pictures, well-done texts, and a beautiful design. I am always surprised by how he challenges the boundaries of storytelling via photography. What is the “truth” in this world?"
Forrest Soper's Favorite
Artist book by Kensuke Koike & Thomas Sauvin
"The way in which we read and interpret photographic images is constantly changing and evolving but by studying and comparing the designs of these three books, one can gain a better understanding of how individual perception is largely dependent on context and presentation."
Marco Delogu's Favorite
Photographs and text by Luigi Ghirri
"I saw too many books of Luigi Ghirri, too many shows. This one has a particular point of view, the seventies, and is a great contribution to understanding the work of Ghirri. It is a serious book on Italy and Ghirri, on the relationship between writers and history."
RVB Books's Favorite
Printed and hand-bound by Sébastien Girard
"This archive of 911 polaroids found by Girard and printed in its integrality could have remained anonymous but a unique self-portrait of the author printed in page 79 reveals the identity of its author and the story behind this visual obsession."