“We Have Nothing To Lose But Our Photography”
Ansel Adams, from the first issue of Aperture magazine, April 1952
Nothing to Lose but Photography (Forthcoming Spring 2027), Cover photograph by Luigi Ghirri
Photography needs aperture
aperture needs you
and you need aperture
The words above appeared in Aperture, in 1953, as the founders made a swift appeal for help. “The first year shows the need and justifies the effort,” the editors of our then-fledgling magazine declared. “The other arts have important and constructive journals,” they argued. Photography deserved the same.
They offered two suggestions: Renew subscriptions promptly and enlist others to subscribe. Supporters then had their names printed in the magazine as sustaining and retaining subscribers. The lists read like a who’s who of the photography world: In the first year alone these included Jacob Deschin (photography critic for The New York Times), Dr. Edwin H. Land (inventor of the Polaroid process), Henry Luce (founder of Life magazine), notable artists (including Laura Gilpin, Roger Mayne, and Dorothy Norman), and a student from Rome named Robert Bright, who wrote:
“I think the first year of Aperture has been a great success. You have the sincere thanks of one student photographer who has read and reread the many inspiring articles. You have given my hungry intellect a substantial meal—and for my wandering spirit you have raised a meaningful and believable signpost. It is an island of reason in a sea of shabby trumpery.”
Next year, we will celebrate Aperture’s seventy-fifth anniversary. Our loyal community who responded to this and many (many!) subsequent calls for support have made this milestone possible.
For the occasion, we will publish Nothing to Lose but Photography, a very special book marking seventy-five years of enduring images and texts published by Aperture. This will be a celebration of words and photographs, and the title is a nod to a quote by Ansel Adams, one of our founders, that appeared in Aperture’s first issue.
We still believe that photography needs aperture, aperture needs you, and you need aperture.
We are dreaming of the portrait of our community that will appear on the final pages of the seventy-fifth-anniversary book.
If you support this landmark publication with a gift of $100 or $500 before October 31, we will publish your name alongside others who believe in our work and want to help it continue. You will also receive a copy of the book upon publication.
It would mean so much not only practically speaking—by defraying the book’s significant expenses—but also to be able to illustrate our vibrant and dedicated community today.
Who could have imagined that the vision and ambition of our founders would have brought us this far? Who knows where we will go in the next seventy-five years and beyond? Wherever that might be, we’re grateful for your support and know that we couldn’t make it without you.
