New topographics (photographic genre)
| New Topographics | |
|---|---|
| Years active | 1970s to present |
| Location | United States and Europe |
New Topographics is a style of urban landscape photography that emerged in the United States during the mid-1970s. The genre is characterized by a detached, straight photography approach to human-altered landscapes. Photographers in this movement reject the romantic and sublime qualities of earlier landscape photography, such as that of Ansel Adams. Instead, Robert Adams, Lewis Baltz, Bernd and Hilla Becher, Joe Deal, Frank Gohlke, Nicholas Nixon, John Schott, Stephen Shore, and Henry Wessel,[1] focus on the commonplace, banal, and industrial features of the contemporary environment.[2][3]
While the term was coined by curator William Jenkins in 1975 to characterize the photographs he selected for the exhibition New Topographics: Photographs of a Man-Altered Landscape at the George Eastman House,[4] it has since been used to describe an ongoing photographic movement. The genre has influenced subsequent generations of photographers both in America and internationally, shaping contemporary approaches to urban, suburban, and industrial landscape photography.[5]
References
- ^ "New Topographics: Photographs of a Man-Altered Landscape". SFMOMA. Retrieved 2026-03-04.
- ^ Hacking, Juliet, ed. (2021). Photography: The Whole Story (Revised and updated ed.). London: Thames & Hudson. p. 401. ISBN 9780500296103.
- ^ Hirsch, Robert (2000). Seizing the Light: A History of Photography. Boston: McGraw-Hill. p. 414. ISBN 9780697143617.
- ^ "New Topographics". MoMA. Retrieved 21 November 2025.
- ^ Turner, Peter (1985). American Images: Photography 1945–1980. London: Viking. p. 105. ISBN 9780670806195.