London. With an Introduction by Hilaire Belloc.

first edition of this important photo-book; a landmark publication in early twentieth-century photography.

A member of Alfred Stieglitz's Photo-Secession circle, Coburn perhaps learnt from Stieglitz the effectiveness of high quality photo-mechanical reproduction as an expressive vehicle for artist-photographers. He was the most important American photographer of his generation to expend significant energy on illustrating books. Amongst his output, Coburn published two books of identical design, one featuring London, the other New York. These exemplify the concern of the more advanced pictorialists with modern subjects, namely the twentieth century city, a shift in attitude that triggered the final push to photographic modernism.