- Selected by Choice as an Outstanding Academic Title for 2011
- Appeals to people interested in artist's use of photography and in contemporary art
- Tracks the efflorescence of photography as one of the most important mediums for contemporary art
- Explores the relation between recent art, theory and aesthetics, for which photography serves as an important test case
- Includes a number of the essays with previously unpublished photographs

Artists discussed include Ed Ruscha, Bernd and Hilla Becher, Douglas Huebler, Mel Bochner, Sherrie Levine, Roni Horn, Thomas Demand, and Jeff Wall