©Virginia McGee Richards,The Inner Passage, published by MIT Press, 2026

We have evolved into a society that can decode the complex images that are a fluid part of our lives. Photobooks have responded to this by moving beyond being containers of recorded information to become immersive experiences of the artist’s narrative and concept.

When text becomes a structural decision, one that considers the frequency and distribution between text and image, it amplifies a book’s experiential quality. The text provokes thought or feeling that is better expressed through language than imagery. The result is an experience of the artist’s vision that actively engages the reader to parse the relationship of words and photographs to understand the meaning.

Hannah Altman’s We Will Return to You, (Saint Lucy Books, 2025) draws from Yiddish literature to consider how storytelling is translated through photographs. The decision to place the text at the center of the book creates a three-chapter structure that begins and ends with the photographs. The fictional poetic prose is encountered in the center as a form of fable. The typography printed with bronze ink, its metallic sheen and large letterforms against the mottled surface of parchment paper embodies the myth and spirituality.

©Hannah Altman, spread from We Will Return to You, published by Saint Lucy Books, 2025

©Hannah Altman, spread from We Will Return to You, published by Saint Lucy Books, 2025

©Hannah Altman, spread from We Will Return to You, published by Saint Lucy Books, 2025

©Hannah Altman, spread from We Will Return to You, published by Saint Lucy Books, 2025

©Hannah Altman, spread from We Will Return to You, published by Saint Lucy Books, 2025

My Mother’s Tender Script (Workshop Arts, 2026) is inspired by a found address book left behind by Asiya Al. Sharabi’s mother a Yemeni woman married at eleven, widowed at fifteen and who never learned to read or write because she wasn’t permitted to go to school. The opening and closing texts provide a frame for the conceptual images. Throughout there are words and fragments in the mother’s voice and that bring an intimacy to the images. The type blends the childlike handwriting of someone who is learning to write with a monospaced typeface to recall journal pages from a typewriter. Together they create an atmosphere that is diaristic, tender and evocative.

©Asiya Al. Sharabi, spread from My Mother’s Tender Script, published by Workshop Arts

©Asiya Al. Sharabi, spread from My Mother’s Tender Script, published by Workshop Arts

©Asiya Al. Sharabi, spread from My Mother’s Tender Script, published by Workshop Arts

©Asiya Al. Sharabi, spread from My Mother’s Tender Script, published by Workshop Arts

©Asiya Al. Sharabi, spread from My Mother’s Tender Script, published by Workshop Arts

In The Inner Passage (MIT Press, 2026) Virginia McGee Richards traces a 300-mile network of colonial-era canals, built largely by enslaved Black people to serve white plantation owners and their commerce that paradoxically became a route to freedom for enslaved people who escaped to Spanish Florida. The research driven project spans photographs, essays, interviews and detailed captions. Each form of text approaches the research with a different style; some are personal and others written with academic rigor. Together the text and photographs create a breadth to the research that leads to a deeper understanding of the narrative.

©Virginia McGee Richards,The Inner Passage, published by MIT Press, 2026

©Virginia McGee Richards,The Inner Passage, published by MIT Press, 2026

©Virginia McGee Richards,The Inner Passage, published by MIT Press, 2026

©Virginia McGee Richards,The Inner Passage, published by MIT Press, 2026

©Virginia McGee Richards,The Inner Passage, published by MIT Press, 2026

We Will Return to You
Saint Lucy Books
Hannah Altman
Book documentation: The Book Photographer
Creative Direction: Luminosity Lab

My Mother’s Tender Script
Workshop Arts
Asiya Al. Sharabi
Book documentation: Steven Paneccasio
Creative Direction: Luminosity Lab

The Inner Passage
MIT Press
Virginia McGee Richards
Book documentation: Steven Paneccasio
Creative Direction :Luminosity Lab