Walking The Streets With Dyer & Winogrand
Richard B. Woodward writes: ‘Geoff Dyer’s new book, The Street Philosophy of Garry Winogrand, is…idiosyncratic. Selecting one hundred images from among the estimated one million that the fantastically prolific street photographer made during his life (1928–1984), Dyer analyzes each one in jaunty riffs that are longer than extended captions but shorter than fully-formed essays. This format, pioneered by the curator John Szarkowski in his books Looking at Photographs (1973; revised 1999) and Atget (2000), requires condensed thought. Dyer is limited to only about 750 words per photograph, with no spillover to the next two-page spread. At the same time, the serial presentation encourages informality. Expansive arguments are hard to sustain when you’re aware of a quickly upcoming, obligatory cut.’
