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CHOICE Review

This is a good introduction (with bibliography) to the photographer who many years ago said, "Some days the mere fact of seeing feels like perfect happiness. You feel as if you're floating along. . .and you feel so rich you long to share your jubilation with others. . ." Hamilton's short introduction is a well-crafted summary of Doisneau's early life and subsequent career. It provides some insight but suggests more questions than it answers about both the man and his work. The pictures present a better sampling of Doisneau's long and varied career as humanist photojournalist and as commercial, fashion, and advertising picturemaker. This exhibition catalog is the first overview of this modest, gentle mocker of authority and establishment, this supportive chronicler of the working class of the France from which he rarely traveled. Doisneau has given us some of the most sophisticated (nonmalicious) photographic humor of the 20th century. A stronger selection of his photographs will be found in his Three Seconds from Eternity (CH, Apr'81), which includes an extraordinarily poetic introduction by Doisneau. Libraries should have both, along with the 1983 Photopoche volume on Doisneau. All levels. C. Chiarenza; University of Rochester