The Americans, by Robert Frank

in

Why?

"All those pictures now, are still ingrained in my head. My consciousness. There's not a picture from there I wouldn't recognize."
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- Martin Parr, Photographer

 "It really opened up the world of documentaries for me."
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- Lauren Greenfield, Photographer

"You have to have that camera ready. We didn't have the cell phones and all that back in the day, but I think the rhythms of recognizing an image, that's what the masters, the older masters."
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- Coreen Simpson, Photographer

"For any book to be published at all, that was that good, was wonderful, and it got the reviews it deserved, as far as I could tell."
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- John Loengard, Photographer

"This transferred to the idea that even beyond photography, that there was a great story in anything if you looked at it with new eyes, if you looked at it differently."
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- Kevin Kelly, co-founder of Wired

"This collection of images offers a lesson in seeing, not only of individuals, but of a whole culture."
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- Joel Meyerowitz, Photographer

“It's special to me because it was the first time seeing a photographer's work who I'd admired so much, as tangible inspiration that I could call my own.”
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- Miranda Barnes, Photographer

“Robert had a singularly un-generous point of view, forgetting about what America is and isn't. His grumpy itemizing of experience is a profoundly important thing, but it was unforgiving.”
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- Larry Fink, Photographer

“There's two copies of it on my bookshelf. There's this straight line through all of these people who have interested me—the beauty of the mundane.”
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-Adam Goldberg, Photographer

The Sweet Flypaper Of Life, by Roy DeCarava, Langston Hughes

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Why?

"Roy DeCarava was the first Black photographer to win the Guggenheim fellowship, and even with the accolades he couldn't get a book publisher. That's until he decided to give his photos to Langston Hughes. This turned out to be a great marriage of photos and words." 
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- Andre Wagner, Photographer

“Roy had an inner power and was able to perceive and feel with his subjects. There is a kind of humility that highlights the nature of inequality. That was an inspiration for me and the precipice of my lifelong work, which [centers around] emotions. It's about photographs, sure, and about making formal things and not pretty pictures, but most of all strong pictures. I like to think of my work as an emotional investigation, or a clinical investigation into what it means to be human.”
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-Larry Fink, Photographer

Until Everything Becomes a Photograph, by Tazuko Masuyama

in

Why?

"A woman’s collection of over 100,000 photographs, taken from age 60 until age 88, when she died. The subject matter focuses on her hometown, gradually disappearing due to the construction of a dam. The photographer continued taking photographs with a simple vision — to leave behind something for her town to be remembered by. In looking at them, I am reminded of my own first, fresh ambition in becoming a photographer, while filled with emotion." 
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- Rinko Kawauchi, Photographer