An Introduction to the History of Photomontage as an Artistic Practice.

Don Ades's book provides an accessible yet comprehensive introduction to the history of photomontage as an artistic practice since the first edition, published in 1976. This translation is based on the third edition, published in 2021, with the author's additions and clarifications. Don Ades clearly outlines the context in which photomontage gained attention as a means of visual expression at the intersection of photography, cinema, the press, politics, and avant-garde art, at a time when all these fields were undergoing rapid transformation. The book also examines the rise of photomontage between the two world wars, when it became a key medium for Dadaism, Surrealism, and early Soviet committed art. Its distinctive rhetoric, developed by artists such as Raoul Hausmann, John Heartfield, László Moholy-Nagy, El Lissitzky, Alexander Rodchenko, and Gustav Klutsis, was taken up by nonconformists of the second half of the 20th century, whose work is also highlighted in the book. The text is accompanied by numerous illustrations, providing a broad and impressive panorama of activist art, effective not only in the cultural but also the political arena.