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Paul Graham

This research aims to be the most comprehensive contextual survey of the work of the photographer Paul Graham and to produce a complete reference study of his work.

Chandler’s essay is intended to be a detailed critical evaluation of Graham’s work during his 35-year career. Based on new research, and a sustained dialogue between author and artist over a period of months in 2009, the essay develops a continuous narrative that systematically addresses each of Graham’s major bodies of work from the late 1970s onwards, setting them within a historical and theoretical framework of British and international photography over more than three decades. In particular it considers the extent to which Graham’s work has contested and extended documentary traditions of photography (particularly those established in Britain) and how it has continued to provide a model for a diverse range of innovative practices.

The book was published by SteidlMACK to coincide with an international touring survey exhibition of Graham’s work to date. After its initial showing at the Folkwang Museum, Essen, Germany, in 2009, the exhibition travelled to Hamburg and London in 2011, where it was shown at The Whitechapel Art Gallery.