© Lars Tunbjörk
The price is not the point. Time is.
Every time someone asks why the price of a book changes over time, I understand the question. It’s fair. But the answer, at least in the way I see publishing and photography, is never only economic. A book doesn’t come into being all at once. It begins when a body of work is questioned and finds its form through a shared editorial vision. It grows while being edited, discussed, designed. And at some point, it closes. For real. Not like most things today, which remain permanently available.
Our way of offering books for pre-order starts from here. It’s not a tool to create urgency, nor an attempt to please the market. It’s an uncomfortable choice. For us, and for those who follow us. Because it introduces something many prefer to avoid: the moment when you have to decide, without pushing everything to later.
Entering a book at the beginning doesn’t mean paying less. It means trusting a project while it is still in progress. When you don’t yet have the book in your hands, when you are choosing an idea, a direction, a way of seeing. Later on, the book is exactly the same, identical in every detail. Only one thing changes: the time you allowed to pass before letting it enter your life.
I know this model can be unsettling. Because it breaks the illusion that everything is always accessible, always the same, always recoverable. But photography, the kind I care about and the kind we publish, doesn’t work like that. An image exists because someone chose to be there at a precise moment. If you arrive too late, the photograph doesn’t happen.
The same applies to books. Time is not a strategy, nor a trick. It is part of the work. Like the paper, the printing, the sequence of images. We don’t compete on the lowest price, and we never have. We compete on the coherence of our decisions, on the responsibility of our choices, on the ability to say no as much as to say yes. Even when that means being less comfortable, less immediate, less aligned. That is the real cost of independence. And for us, it’s the only one worth paying.
Marco Savarese
Editor-in-Chief
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Marco Savarese
Marco Savarese is Editor-in-Chief at Eyeshot, the independent publisher he founded in Italy in 2018. He spends most of his year reading portfolios, judging the Open Call, and editing the magazine catalogue. The reading desk is open, and he takes one-to-one Professional Reviews from photographers working seriously on long-term projects.
Who Finishes Your Photograph
NOTE #210. A photo isn’t finished until it survives to where people see it. Paul Strand chose hand photogravure for Photographs of Mexico so the printed copy kept the tonal weight of his prints. Protect the tone to the end, or the worst medium decides for you.
What the Dark Does
NOTE #209. A face lost in shadow reads as underexposed, a defect to fix. Gordon Willis kept Brando’s eyes in the dark in The Godfather and held it against the studio. Before you rescue a shadow, ask what it does; if you can say it, you decided it.
The Place After
NOTE #208. Of a huge event, often only an ordinary place is left. In On This Site (1996) Joel Sternfeld photographed fifty banal American places where violence happened, each with a line of text. Photograph the aftermath, and let the line do the work.
The Photo Made Together
NOTE #206. Street photography teaches you to steal people; there’s another way. In Malick Sidibé’s Bamako studio the youth chose how to be seen. Before you take someone, ask how they’d want to look, and make the photo together.
Write Your Own Rules
NOTE #205. The thing that improves you most isn’t a new camera, it’s a short list of your own faults. Tony Ray-Jones kept a notebook of orders to himself and it shaped Martin Parr. Write your three rules and keep them in your pocket.
Watch the Master Work
NOTE #204. You don’t learn from a master’s finished prints, you learn from watching them work. In 1962 Joel Meyerowitz watched Robert Frank shoot, quit his job that day, and picked up a camera. Watch the body, not the result.
The Work Before the Name
NOTE #203. The worth of a photo and the worth of the byline are two different things. Koudelka shot the 1968 Prague invasion anonymously as ‘P.P.’ and revealed it sixteen years later. Photograph what must be photographed even when no one will know it was you.
The Subject You Run From
NOTE #202. The strongest subject you have is the one you’d rather not photograph. Ishiuchi Miyako went back to Yokosuka, the occupied base town she was taught to fear, and made it her life’s work. Point the camera where it’s uncomfortable.