Flak Photo
Daylight Magazine
VII Photo
Despite belt-tightening at most publishing companies, photobooks are experiencing a renaissance in the midst of the digital revolution. In early 2010, Miki Johnson and Andy Adams explored this phenomenon in a month-long online discussion organized through the liveBooks RESOLVE blog, and FlakPhoto, which they respectively founded.
Moderator Stephen Mayes will guide an interactive tour through many of the questions that surfaced during the Future of Photobooks project: from “What is a book?” and “Why make or buy a book?” to “Will self-published photobooks ever be profitable?” and “Do more photobooks in the world ultimately make each book less valuable?”
You can find more about the Future of Photobooks project here: tinyurl.com/ye7wakl
Andy Adams is the Editor/Publisher of FlakPhoto.com, a contemporary photography website that celebrates the culture of image-making by promoting the discovery of artists from around the world. An online art space + photography publication, the site provides opportunities for a global community of artists and photo organizations to share new series work, book projects, and gallery exhibitions with a web-based photography audience.
Self Publish, Be Happy is an organization founded by Bruno Ceschel in 2010 with the aim of celebrating and promoting self-published photobooks through events (such as fairs, exhibitions and conferences), publications and online exposure. Self Publish, Be Happy also organizes workshops that assists artists and photographers in the creation and publishing of their own books. selfpublishbehappy.com
Michael Itkoff is a photographer, writer, educator and a Founding Editor of Daylight Magazine. Michael’s photographs have appeared on the covers of Orion Magazine, Katalog, Next American City and Philadelphia Weekly and his writing has appeared in the NYTimes Lens blog, Art Asia Pacific, Nueva Luz, Conscientious blog and the Forward. He has been a recipient of the Howard Chapnick Grant for the Advancement of Photojournalism (2006), a Creative Artists Fellowship from the Pennsylvania Arts Council (2007), and a Puffin Foundation Grant (2008). Michael’s monograph ‘Street Portraits’ was published by Charta Editions in 2009. He received a BA from Sarah Lawrence College in 2004 and an M.F.A. in Advanced Photographic Studies from ICP/Bard in 2010.
As the Social Media Editor for liveBooks until April 2010, Miki Johnson edited the RESOLVE Photo Blog and facilitated online communication using tools like Facebook and Twitter. Before joining liveBooks, Miki was Senior Editor at American Photo Magazine in New York City, where she also launched and edited the first year of Pop Photo College Edition. She is currently working as a social media consultant, photography writer, and organizing a new workshop series titled “Matchstick.”She is currently working on individual projects and running her own blog, Hey Miki.
Shane Lavalette currently lives and works in Somerville, MA. He received his BFA from Tufts University in partnership with The School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Lavalette’s photographs have been exhibited widely, including recent exhibitions at Aperture Gallery, Montserrat College of Art Gallery, The Carpenter Center for Visual Arts at Harvard University, The Center for Photography at Woodstock and The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. In 2009, he was awarded the Yousuf Karsh Prize in Photography. His editorial work has been published in various magazines, including The New York Times Magazine, Vice and SLASH. Lavalette is also the Publisher and Editor of Lay Flat, an independent imprint for contemporary photography.
Alan Rapp is the founder of the consultancy and visual book packager ARstudio. With more than fifteen years publishing experience, he works with authors, visual artists, photographers, and designers to develop visual book projects and bring them to publication.
As the acquiring editor overseeing the art, architecture, design, and photography lists of the innovative San Francisco publisher Chronicle Books, Alan acquired and developed more than 100 titles over the course of ten years. In the photography world alone he has collaborated with such artists as David Maisel, Jim Marshall, Elinor Carucci, Justin Guariglia, Debra Bloomfield, Terry Falke, Stuart Klipper, Linda Connor, Jo Whaley, Nick Brandt, and Jona Frank. He also has extensive experience with noted authors from speculative architecture critic Geoff Manaugh to design historian Steven Heller, as well as some of the most distinctive visual artists today, such as Sandow Birk and Isabel Samaras.
In his capacity as an architecture and design writer and editor, he has recently been appointed as the US editor of DomusWeb. He has contributed to the New City Reader, Dwell, Urban Omnibus and numerous other publications. He is a graduate of the inaugural class of School of Visual Arts’ Design Criticism MFA program, and teaches a course in globalism and design at Parsons the New School of Design, as well as a graduate-level seminar at RISD. He lives in Brooklyn.
Stephen Mayes writes and broadcasts on the ethics and realities of photographic practice. He has worked with photography, art and journalism for 25 years as a Creative Director (SVP Content at Getty Images, Photonica, and Eyestorm.com), and as CEO (of Network Photographers London, amana New York, and the Art + Commerce Image Archive). He has curated several internationally touring exhibitions and has been secretary of World Press Photo competition since 2004. He is currently Managing Director of VII Photo.