BEST OF PHOTO BOOKS: FROM WAR TO IRELAND

Author: By Cate McQuaid

Date: SUNDAY, December 7, 1997

Page: G5

Section: Books

But first, to the heart-wrenching: ``Requiem: By the Photographers Who Died in Vietnam and Indochina'' (Random House, $65) was edited by veteran photojournalists Horst Faas and Tim Page, both of whom were wounded in pursuit of pictures in Vietnam. It packs scores of color and black-and-white photos into a moving history of the coverage of that war. Wire reports, interviews, and transcribed radio transmissions punctuate the graphic imagery, telling in words the poignant stories behind the men and women who took these pictures. Shots by Larry Burrows and Robert Capa are here, alongside the work of lesser-known photographers who were on assignment for only a few days before they were killed or disappeared.

Germans Klaus Honnef and Rolf Sachsse, along with American Karin Thomas, indulge in some fierce self-reflection in ``German Photography: 1870-1970'' (Yale University Press, $60). This substantial catalog for an exhibit earlier this year at Kunst und Ausstellunghalle in Bonn places photographs in the context of history, posing questions about the role of photography in Nazi propaganda, the depiction of Jews, and the padlock Germans still put on certain types of self-expression (or did as recently as 1970). As much textbook as photography book, ``German Photography'' surveys not only political but fine art and fashion photography, and includes an array of visuals that seem mostly to strive for an ideal of strength and beauty and rarely let their guard down.

There is much less sturm und drang in two one-artist retrospectives: ``Irving Penn: A Career in Photography'' (Bulfinch Press/Little, Brown, $60) and ``The Essential Duane Michals'' (Bulfinch Press/Little, Brown, $50). The Penn book, accompanying an exhibit now at the Art Institute of Chicago, moves from the photographer's commercial work for Vogue to his portraits, still-lifes, and ethnographic shots, tracing the trajectory of Penn's vision. Editor Colin Westerbeck smartly manages to organize the book both by suit and by rank, grouping portraits together but occasionally throwing in a still-life of cigarette butts to show how full of portrait-personality such a mundane subject can be.

Duane Michals's comical, poignant, existential explorations combine black-and-white photography and narrative, often in the form of hand-scratched text. Through his work, the artist invites us on his life journey as he grapples with issues of mortality, relationship, and sexuality in irresistible, humane photo sequences. Text by Marco Livingstone is both astute and admirably restrained; he knows how well Michals speaks for himself.

When the Metropolitan Museum of Art first published ``Georgia O'Keeffe: A Portrait by Alfred Stieglitz'' (Metropolitan Museum of Art/Abrams, $60) in 1978, some critics declared it the most beautiful photography book ever published. Now amended with 30 more images, bringing the total to 81, the book still has the dignity, beauty, and complexity of the artist herself. Full of stunningly printed nudes, portraits, and images of O'Keeffe's hands photographed by Stieglitz, her husband and mentor, the book captures the charge of their passionate, difficult relationship. You can also see the tension, so central to the interpretation of O'Keeffe's own work, between being her viewer's (or photographer's) muse and being her own woman.

You can pay an armchair visit to the America of almost a century ago in Michael Lesy's ``Dreamland: America at the Dawn of the Twentieth Century'' (New Press, $40). Lesy has compiled postcards put out by the Detroit Publishing Company, founded by Western landscape photographer William Henry Jackson and entrepreneur William Livingstone in 1898. More than 200 images are grouped thematically, and put into context by yearly chronologies covering the first decade of this century. They are a vision of what America could be, taken at a moment of great hope. It's a lovely book, but be warned: It's printed on black paper that smudges as soon as you touch it.

Berenice Abbott's compendium of more than 300 New York photographs from the '30s crystallized the way many people saw and continue to see that city. ``Berenice Abbott -- Changing New York: The Complete WPA Project'' (New Press, $60) has the young photographer setting out to capture Gotham the way her mentor, Eugene Atget, captured Paris. From the tenements of the Lower East Side to the skyscrapers downtown, Abbott's view of New York is both humane and modern. The catalog at the back, with background on each site photographed, is nearly as valuable as the photos themselves.

On the other side of the country, ``Ansel Adams' California'' (Bulfinch Press/Little, Brown, $50) is classic, breathtaking Adams. Like no other photographer, he captured the quality of light in his home state and made it so palpable you can drink it. Not quite up to that standard, but still quite good, is ``This Land is Your Land: Across America by Air'' (Aperture, $50) by Marilyn Bridges. Like Adams, Bridges works at dawn and dusk, when the light is thickest and the shadows are longest. Bridges dwells in the shadows, using them to throw sunlit barns, palm trees, and power plants into vivid relief, drawing an ominous, though lovely, picture of the American landscape.

Aerial photographer Kevin Dwyer shot the coastline of his native Ireland in ``Ireland: Our Island Home'' (Collins Press, $39.95). Unlike Bridges' book, this is more a topographical journey than an artistic one, but if it's information on the shape and details of Ireland's shores you're looking for, you'll find it here, from the sheep polka-dotting seaside pastures in County Down to the rugged Cliffs of Moher in County Clare.

Finally, if you can't decide on a single photographer or theme, check out ``The Photography Book'' (Phaidon, $39.95), a thick collection of 500 photographers, listed alphabetically and cross-referenced, each with one image (for photographer-of-all-trades Penn, the editors included a cigarette-butt shot). Photojournalists, fine-art photographers, and fashion professionals are here, from Lewis Carroll to Nan Goldin. ``The Photography Book'' may be shallow, but it's very broad, and a quite useful reference book.