As an author and curator, photo historian Hans-Michael Koetzle draws on countless personal encounters and detailed conversations with the greats of photography, flanked by meticulous archive research. He always has the contemporary historical background and cultural-historical context in mind. His books, such as Eyes on Paris – Paris in Photobooks 1890 to Today or Open your eyes! – 100 years of Leica have long been standard works. For the first time, this volume brings together the author's essays and interviews, published over around four decades, in a reader, thus uncovering a treasure trove of photo-historical knowledge. Hans-Michael Koetzle, for whom writing about photography has always been a main concern alongside curating, accompanies us on astonishing paths through the history and present of photography as a multifaceted medium in transition.

Interviews with and essays on: Ellen Auerbach, Bruno Barbey, Alexey Brodovitch, René Burri, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Robert Doisneau, William Eggleston, Willy Fleckhaus, Peter Galassi, FC Gundlach, Ernst Haas, Fred Herzog, Michael Horbach, André Kertész, Klaus Kinold, Saul Leiter, Alexander Liberman, Herbert List, Martin Parr, Paolo Roversi, Wim Wenders et al.

The publication of this book was made possible by the Klaus Kinold Foundation for Architecture + Photography. Thanks for their kind support go to: German Society for Photography (DGPh) eV, Leica Camera AG and The PhotoBookMuseum gGmb.