Saint Patrick’s People

Just published by Cafe Royal Books is Saint Patrick’s People, with 27 black and white images by John Benton-Harris, from his many years of photographing St Patrick’s Day events in America and Ireland. He has also photographed them extensively in the UK and I’m fairly sure he is out there now in London continuing his work on the subject.

Born in New York, Benton-Harris came to the UK to photograph Churchill’s funeral and has lived here since, contributing greatly to photography in this country, both through his own photography, some of which you can also see in another CRB book, The English, and also as a lecturer and curator.

It was his vision and contacts that lay behind the major Barbican show introducing those who were not long-term readers of Creative Camera (they published his pictures in two features in 1971 and many other now well-known US names) to post-war American photography, ‘American Images – Photography 1945-1980‘ in 1985, though most of the credit went unfairly to his British collaborators, and later shows included the 1986 ‘Let Truth Be the Prejudice‘ and 1989 ‘Through the Looking Glass‘ Photography Art in Britain 1945-1980.

You can see more of John Benton-Harris’s work, both pictures and a little writing on his web site.

Published at the same time on CRB is another fine book, Chris Killip — Huddersfield 1974 and other recent volumes include Wolverhampton 1978 by Chris Steele-Perkins. All worth a trip to your favourite photographic bookshop or you can order them on the web at Cafe Royal Books.

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