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Earth Is My Witness: The Photography of Art Wolfe is one of the most stunning books of photography I own, and is by far the best collection of Art Wolfe’s photography I’ve ever seen. I love this book!
The book is 396 pages, most of which are full of photographs. There are full page photos, pages with two photos per page, full bleed photos that stretch across two pages, and pages that unfold with multiple photos per page.
The book is organized by types of environments, containing the following sections:
Introduction by Wade Davis
Mountain
Polar - Subpolar
Desert - Savanna
Ocean - Island
Tropical - Subtropical
Afterword
Photo Notes
Acknowledgements
Each photography section has an introduction where Art talks about those environments and his experiences photographing in them. It’s always great reading these kinds of intros, getting to learn more about Art, his history, his photography, and the peoples, places, and locations he has visited and photographed. But as great as these introductions are, the focus of this book is definitely on the photography, with page after page of large, bold, vivid photographs.
The particular edition I own is the original large fine art edition from 2014. It measures 11 x 14 inches and is 1.5 inches thick. There is also a smaller edition measuring 5.8 x 12.2 inches and also 1.5 inches thick. Both editions are 396 pages in length.
The large edition has some of the most saturated colors I’ve ever seen in a printed book. It’s almost like a book full of inkjet prints instead of the typical books of photography I’m used to. Don’t get me wrong, I love all my other books of photography, but this one just seems far more punchy, more vivid, more alive.
According to Art Wolfe’s website the large edition used a new color reproduction technique called Chroma Centric™, which it says is eight times more precise than standard offset printing, and enhances the color gamut by more than 25 percent. And I certainly can see the difference in many of the photographs. I would love to see more books use this printing technique.
Earth Is My Witness would be a great book for anyone who loves nature, travel, wildlife, landscapes, and photography of indigenous peoples. And for any fan of Art Wolfe’s photography. It has become one of my favorite books of photography and one I’m very happy to have in my collection.
