Ten Photographs (Paperback)

The ten photographs in this portfolio are contact prints from 11x14-inch negatives, the largest format Brett Weston ever used, and the largest practical format for any but the most ardent devotee of view cameras and contact prints. Brett employed this camera between 1944 and the early 1960s, when he realised that new medium-format roll-film cameras like the Rollei SL66 (which made relatively small 2 1/4-inch square negatives), were so good that he could abandon contact prints altogether. By 1963, Weston felt confident that he had enough 11x14 prints to select ten pictures that fit his criteria for a portfolio-quality, variety, unity, and ease of printing-and since he did not use the 11x14 camera after this time, he may have intended this portfolio as a farewell to the big camera itself. Like his previous portfolios, this selection is neutral, and the portfolio has no text or predetermined order. As a group, these pictures are quieter, more relaxed, and somewhat less shocking or abstract than his previous portfolios, perhaps because of the limitations of the camera.