More Than Meets the Eye

Coffee-table books are more than a collection of images with captions. They are material and cultural objects. This chapter examines the coffee-table book in two sections. Firstly, as a culturally resonant object, then as an objet d’art requiring great skill and technical considerations. The first section, Cultural Resonance, features three coffee-table books. Hi-Tech: The Industrial Style and Source Book for the Home, The Art Book and The Australians. Each book was chosen for different reasons but the common link is that their publication achieved significant cultural resonance with a post-war audience. Hi-Tech: The Industrial Style and Source Book for the Home, published in America in 1978 captured the zeitgeist. The book signified the arrival of the Hi-Tech architectural movement. The Art Book, first published by Phaidon in 1994, played a significant role in introducing a wide range of major artworks to a large general audience. The Australians, published in 1966, was the most successful book of any kind in Australia for its characterisation of post-war Australia. The second section of this chapter, Producing Objets d’art, discusses the technical skills and material considerations required to produce a coffee-table book. These abilities are particularly evident when authenticity is required to reproduce artworks on a page. This section draws on descriptions of the many skills and considerations regarding format, visual narratives, authenticity and materiality. The examples chosen each shed light on why and how decisions are made in the production of high-quality, photographically illustrated books. In particular, coffee-table art books.