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The Genius of Photography

The Genius of Photography is a BBC documentary series exploring the history of photography, from the earliest days of the photograph in the 1840s to the first decade of the 21st century. The series consists of six episodes looking at all the different genres of photography from art, news and reportage, landscape and portrait photography. The series includes interviews with some of the world's greatest living photographers, such as William Eggleston, Nan Goldin and William Klein, as well as examines in detail the work of some of the greatest and most influential modern photographers, including Alexander Rodchenko, August Sander and Man Ray.

Episode 1 Episode 2 Episode 3 Episode 4 Episode 6

Episode 1 - Fixing the Shadows
This episode tells the story of the birth of photography itself and the profound question that it raised, and which has never been satisfactorily answered: what is photography for?

Episode 2 - Documents for Artists
This episode examines in detail the work of some of the greatest and most influential modern photographers: Alexander Rodchenko, August Sander, Man Ray, Eugene Atget, Walker Evans and Bill Brandt.

Episode 3 - Right Time, Right Place
This episode examines how photographers dealt with dramatic and tragic events like D-Day, the Holocaust and Hiroshima.

Episode 4 - Paper Movies
This episode looks at the golden age of photographic journeys from the late 1950s onwards, including the road movies of Robert Frank and the grainy street dramas of William Klein.

Episode 5 - We Are Family
This episode is about what happens when photography translates personal relationships into photographic ones, when strangers, celebrities, lovers and children get fed to the camera.

Episode 6 - Snap Judgements
This episode looks at the current state of the art, from a three-million-dollar Edward Steichen print to the estimated 29 billion photographs taken in 2006 by phone cameras alone.