Description
Book SynopsisMartin Parr, one of Britain''s best-known contemporary photographers, and President of Magnum, the world-famous photographic agency has undertaken a photo-documentary book project. Oxford is a collection of around 100 photographs documenting an academic year in the life of the university. They capture the day-to-day life of the colleges and University at work and play, and the colourful and arcane rituals that make it so distinctive. His photographs are accompanied by an extended afterword that draws on, and enriches, the photographic material and penned by Simon Winchester, OBE, the British writer, journalist and broadcaster. The very first photo-documentary of Oxford was created by William Henry Fox Talbot. A century and a half later, Martin Parr''s new project pays tribute to the great the pioneer of photography, and coincides with the Bodleian Library''s bid to secure his personal archive.
Trade ReviewThere are more than 100 photographs which together evoke a strong sense of place and the ordinariness of the people inhabiting it. * Katie Law, Evening Standard *
In Oxford the celebrated photographer Martin Parr has gathered a set of 118 plates of Oxford scenes and characters, accompanied by a reminiscence of student life in the 1960s by Simon Winchester, and beautifully published by Oxford University Press... eye-catching and stimulating. * Revd. Dr. Martin Wellings, Methodist Recorder Vol.17 *
Martin Parr's star has never been higher. * Geoff Harris, Amateur Photographer *
Parr is often accused of mocking his subject matter, but while containing the occasional quirk, this is a largely straight documentation of a subject that already happily embraces moments of absurdity with great seriousness. * Eliza Williams, Creative Review *
