Strange and Familiar is an exhibition of more than 250 photographs of British life since the 1930s, taken by foreign photographers and selected by the British photographer Martin Parr; it ran at the Barbican Art Gallery in the City of London from March to June this year. “Strange and familiar” is also a good description of the process of making an exhibition catalogue.
It is familiar because Prestel publishes around 50 catalogues a year across our London, Munich and New York offices. In this case, familiarity was enhanced by the fact that this was my third exhibition catalogue for the Barbican, after Constructing Worlds: Photography and Architecture in the Modern Age and Magnificent Obsessions: The Artist as Collector. On Constructing Worlds I had already worked with the Barbican’s Alona Pardo, who curated Strange and Familiar with Martin Parr.
Yet making a catalogue is always strange, because any exhibition is unique and it is only through understanding its particularities that you can transform a catalogue so that it does not simply document a show but is an exciting and engaging book in its own right.
By the time it reaches the publisher, an exhibition will likely be fairly well developed, so the first important task is to work out whether the concept and contents have the potential to work in the trade, away from and after the exhibition. With Strange and Familiar, there were a number of elements – nostalgia, Britishness, wonderful photography, a high-profile curator – that could, we felt, if channelled properly, give the book a broad appeal.
For me, exhibition catalogues provide an interesting challenge – they have fleshed-out concepts, greater restrictions on content than other books, and far tighter schedules (eased by exhibition assistants such as Jilke Golbach and Taous Dahmani). You have to be more creative and subtle in shaping the book for the appropriate audience, by helping choose the best format, price-point, design aesthetic and structure for largely pre-existing material.
The guts of Strange and Familiar are pretty standard: introductory texts, a plate section with short texts on the artists, all bookended by helpful appendices. But the look and feel, the choice of materials and quality of design work together with the content to make it stand out.
We take pride in publishing beautiful books. With a book that focuses on photography, the quality of the materials and reproductions is paramount. It is only thanks to the experience and knowledge of production colleagues like Andrea Cobré that we can make books like this one.
We also understand the importance of working with the most talented designers. Stefi Orazi’s inspired design for this book nods to traditional photo books but breaks the mould with its bold typography and cover material. Inside, it changes subtly through the sections; Orazi’s ability to give a book the right pace and to place pictures beautifully allows the outstanding photography to shine.
And it is through this combination of beautiful design, top quality production, creative editing, an interesting concept and great content that one can bring together the strange and familiar elements of an exhibition catalogue and turn them into something exciting, coherent and desirable.
Lincoln Dexter is an associate editor at Prestel Publishing.
Strange and Familiar will be at Manchester Art Gallery from 25 November 2016 to 29 May 2017
It is familiar because Prestel publishes around 50 catalogues a year across our London, Munich and New York offices. In this case, familiarity was enhanced by the fact that this was my third exhibition catalogue for the Barbican, after Constructing Worlds: Photography and Architecture in the Modern Age and Magnificent Obsessions: The Artist as Collector. On Constructing Worlds I had already worked with the Barbican’s Alona Pardo, who curated Strange and Familiar with Martin Parr.
Yet making a catalogue is always strange, because any exhibition is unique and it is only through understanding its particularities that you can transform a catalogue so that it does not simply document a show but is an exciting and engaging book in its own right.
By the time it reaches the publisher, an exhibition will likely be fairly well developed, so the first important task is to work out whether the concept and contents have the potential to work in the trade, away from and after the exhibition. With Strange and Familiar, there were a number of elements – nostalgia, Britishness, wonderful photography, a high-profile curator – that could, we felt, if channelled properly, give the book a broad appeal.
For me, exhibition catalogues provide an interesting challenge – they have fleshed-out concepts, greater restrictions on content than other books, and far tighter schedules (eased by exhibition assistants such as Jilke Golbach and Taous Dahmani). You have to be more creative and subtle in shaping the book for the appropriate audience, by helping choose the best format, price-point, design aesthetic and structure for largely pre-existing material.
The guts of Strange and Familiar are pretty standard: introductory texts, a plate section with short texts on the artists, all bookended by helpful appendices. But the look and feel, the choice of materials and quality of design work together with the content to make it stand out.
We take pride in publishing beautiful books. With a book that focuses on photography, the quality of the materials and reproductions is paramount. It is only thanks to the experience and knowledge of production colleagues like Andrea Cobré that we can make books like this one.
We also understand the importance of working with the most talented designers. Stefi Orazi’s inspired design for this book nods to traditional photo books but breaks the mould with its bold typography and cover material. Inside, it changes subtly through the sections; Orazi’s ability to give a book the right pace and to place pictures beautifully allows the outstanding photography to shine.
And it is through this combination of beautiful design, top quality production, creative editing, an interesting concept and great content that one can bring together the strange and familiar elements of an exhibition catalogue and turn them into something exciting, coherent and desirable.
Lincoln Dexter is an associate editor at Prestel Publishing.
Strange and Familiar will be at Manchester Art Gallery from 25 November 2016 to 29 May 2017
