Camera Owner

Camera Owner (1964-1968) was a bi-monthly British hobbyist photography magazine founded in 1964. In 1968 it evolved into Creative Camera, a monthly magazine of fine art and documentary photography, which in turn, in 2000, became DPICT before its publication ceased in 2001.

Camera Owner
Camera Owner magazine, cover of the first issue, 1964
EditorBill Jay
Former editorsJürgen Schadeberg
FrequencyBi-monthly
FormatA4
PublisherDavpet Ltd., then Coo Press
FounderSylvester Stein
Founded1964
First issueJune 1, 1964 (1964-06-01)
Final issue
Number		October 31, 1967 (1967-10-31)
no. 40, October 1967
CountryUnited Kingdom
Based inLondon
LanguageEnglish
OCLC503854539

History

When Camera Owner was launched in 1964 from 27 Whitfield Street, London,[1] edited by Alec Fry ARPS[2] previously of Amateur Photographer magazine,[3] it offered pictorial 'how-to' articles for an audience ranging from the keen amateur to the dabbler with no interest in technical jargon; it was subtitled ‘The Teach-Yourself Photo Monthly’.[2]

From Issue #8 of February 1965 South African photographer Jürgen Schadeberg, picture editor of the influential Drum magazine in the 1950s, took over as picture editor, exercising a stronger design and a bolder use of pictures. By Issue #10, in April 1965, Fry moved on to establish Polysales Progress mail order firm, and Schadeberg took on the editorship.[4]

Reorientation

In July 1965, Bill Jay[5] had contributed two articles to the magazine and by December of the same year he took over as Editor. His aim was to promote British photography as a serious art form to rival the U.S. Aperture and Norman Hall's Photography, and the Swiss Romeo Martinez' Camera.[6] He instituted book reviews in 1966 (for example, of John Szarkowski's The Photographer's Eye, July 1967) and interviews (including with Aaron Siskind and David Douglas Duncan).[5] Magazine content emphasised the aesthetics of photography over technique, and Jay encouraged his readers to initiate 'postal circles' by circulating a boxed print by mail to a group for feedback.

Colin Osman,[7] himself a keen photographer, historian and collector of photography,[8][9][10][11][12] and owner of Coo Press, a publishing house with a long and lucrative history of racing pigeon publications, bought the failing Camera Owner from the publishers Davpet Ltd. for £1 in 1966.[13] Jay remained as editor and continued to change the style of the magazine,[14] so that it attracted more serious readers and contributors, amongst them young British photographers like David Hurn and Tony Ray-Jones.

Reformation

Jay gradually transformed the ‘hobbyist’ Camera Owner during 1967, wth the word ‘Creative’, in a smaller font, being placed above the title ‘Camera Owner’, and ‘Owner’ reduced, by December, to a smaller font so that ‘Creative Camera’ dominated the masthead.[2] With the reorientation of content that Jay had introduced, the journal finally became Creative Camera alone in February 1968, continuing with that title through more than 30 years of publication.[15]

See also

References
  1. Writers' and artists' year-book, Volume 59 A. and C. Black, 1966
  2. "From Camera Owner to Creative Camera". The Golden Fleece. 30 October 2012. Retrieved 4 September 2019.
  3. "Amateur Photographer". www.photomemorabilia.co.uk. Retrieved 4 September 2019.
  4. David Allan Mellor, "A Contextual Chronology", p.150. In David Allan Mellor, ed., No Such Thing as Society: Photography in Britain 1967–87: From the British Council and the Arts Council Collection (London: Hayward, 2007; ISBN 978-1-85332-265-5).
  5. Val Williams, 'Crowned with Thorns: Creative Camera 1965-1978'. In Creative Camera No.321, April–May 1993
  6. Bill Jay, "What Happened Here?: Photography in Britain since 1968. Archived July 8, 2011, at the Wayback Machine" Conference at the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television, Bradford, England, 14 October 2004.
  7. Hopkinson, Amanda (16 April 2002). "Obituary: Colin Osman". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 4 September 2019.
  8. Osman, Colin (1999). Jerusalem caught in time. Garnet Publishing. ISBN 978-1-85964-120-0.
  9. Osman, Colin (1997). Egypt : caught in time. Garnet. ISBN 978-1-873938-95-9.
  10. Englander, David A; Osman, Colin; Arts Council of Great Britain (1981). The British worker photographs of working life 1839-1939. Arts Council of Great Britain. ISBN 978-0-7287-0280-6.
  11. Rodger, George; Osman, Colin; Caiger-Smith, Martin (1987). Magnum opus : fifty years in photojournalism. Nishen. ISBN 978-1-85378-001-1.
  12. Vargas, Ava, ed. (1986). La casa de cita: Mexican photographs from the Belle Epoque. Quartet. ISBN 978-0-7043-2578-4.
  13. Colin Ford. Obituary:Colin Osman, a significant and colourful figure. In The PhotoHistorian No. 139, Journal of the Historical Group of the Royal Photographic Society, September 2002, Twickenham, UK
  14. Warren, Lynne; Warren, Lynn (2005), Encyclopedia of Twentieth-Century Photography, 3-Volume Set, Taylor and Francis, ISBN 978-0-203-94338-0
  15. Brittain, David (1999). Creative camera : thirty years of writing. Manchester University Press. ISBN 978-0-7190-5804-2.
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