
A booklet for an exhibition at the 1976 Venice Biennale surveying improvements in city planning in the Netherlands, based on the concept that good living environments go beyond shelter.

A poignant photographic exploration of the dangers of nuclear war and the desire for peace.

This offers an insight into early Dutch punk zines from 1977 - 1980, when Punk first hit The Netherlands. It is a rare collection curated by Matt Plezier focusing on the graphic output of the zines, from covers, ads, band pages, comics and collages. Most zines deteriorated overtime as most zines were stenciled, an inferior but readily available printing technique at that time.

A themed collection of Araki photographs. Issue 17: Sensual Flowers.

In more than three decades, Kentridge has produced an oeuvre spanning diverse media including animated film, drawings, prints and rare books, stage production and sculpture. A Poem That Is Not Our Own aims to create a link between his early drawings and films from the 1980s and 1990s and his most recent work.

Renowned and highly regarded for his experiments with literature, painting, film, and music, William S. Burroughs was also a prolific photographer. This book reproduces some of his rarely seen works, accompanied by texts.

Enghelab Street, Revolution Street explores Tehran’s iconic book district through Iranian artist Hannah Darabi’s collection of photographic and propaganda publications from 1979–1983. Covering a brief period of relative free expression between the Shah’s fall and the Islamic government’s rise, the book presents a visual essay with critical commentary by Chowra Makaremi, revealing rare printed materials from a transformative cultural moment

A themed collection of Araki photographs.
.jpg)
A collection of self portraits by 60 female artists and photographs, offering a glimpse into the (caucasian) female experience and concerns in the late 1970s after the Women's Liberation Movement.

Pictures From Home is a landmark visual memoir and photography book by artist Larry Sultan, first published in 1992. It combines contemporary photographs, film stills from 1950s/1960s home movies, and text to explore the complexities of his parents' lives in suburban Southern California and the myth of the American Dream.


The eighth volume of the Villages and Towns series explores vernacular architecture across the Iberian Peninsula. With texts by Fernando Higueras Díaz and photographs by Yukio Futagawa, it examines landscape, climate, community harmony, environmental preservation, and natural light, highlighting shared regional principles that create enduring architectural diversity.

In this book, Chanarin uses the camera and the photographic encounter to speak towards, penetrate, and critique our lived experience. Drawing as much from August Sander as W. G. Sebald, Chanarin's photographic wanderings and auto-fictional experiments engage with the artist's subjectivity while querying the slippery terrain of documentary photography.

Alexey Brodovitch was a Russian-born American designer, photographer, and educator known for revolutionising graphic design and art direction, particularly during his long tenure as Art Director of Harper's Bazaar. He is celebrated for introducing the avant-garde European aesthetic to American design, using dramatic layouts, bold typography, and generous white space, and for mentoring a new generation of influential photographers like Richard Avedon and Irving Penn. This book presents a look into his work as one of the most important graphic designers and photographers of the 20th century.

This book presents examples of graphic design, emblems, interior design, signs, book jackets, labels, and logos by Pentagram.

Richard Kern’s classic and long out of print book of black and white photographs of young women was published by a Tokyo Gallery in 1996 as a way to get some of his erotic images from the book New York Girls past the censors in Japan. This book, published early in Kern’s career, features nude photos of girls he knew and worked with from New York’s downtown art and music scene.

A themed collection of Araki photographs. Issue No.9: Private Diary 1999

Documenta 6 complete catalogue including: Volume I painting / plastic environment / performance; Volume II photography / film / video; Volume III hand drawings / utopian design / books. Featuring the work of almost every important artist ever, including Chantal Akerman, Pierre Alechinsky, Robert Altman, Diane Arbus, Cecil Beaton, Joseph Beuys, Brassaï, Fellini, Agnes Martin, Man Ray, Mapplethorpe and so many more.

A sweet life full of pleasure and indulgence, 'La Dolce Vita' was a phrase that entered popular usage following the success of the 1960 film La Dolce Vita written and directed by Federico Fellini and starring Marcello Mastroianni, Anita Ekberg and Anouk Aimee. As a phrase it has come to sum up the Golden Age of stylish sophistication in Italy that spanned the years 1958 to 1964. This beautifully illustrated book features over 300 surprisingly candid and revealing photographs from this remarkable era, and captures an era of effortless cool and glamorous style.

Broken Music is an essential compendium for records created by visual artist and focuses on recordings, record-objects, artwork for records, and record installations made by thousands of artists between WWII and 1989. Artists featured include: Vito Acconci, Laurie Anderson, Joseph Beuys, William Burroughs, John Cage, Merce Cunningham, Marcel Duchamp, Allen Ginsberg, Philip Glass, Allan Kaprow, John Lennon, Sol Lewitt, Roy Lichtenstein, Frank O’Hara, Yoko Ono, Michael Snow, Nam June Paik and more.
.jpg)
During a Jack Kerouac-inspired road trip that lasted nine years, the photographer William Eggleston documented working-class towns, rest stop diners, dilapidated gas stations, and barren stretches of land in the American South and Southwest. For thirty years following Eggleston’s trip, the images sat in a warehouse as he focused on other work, many of them unseen. In 2002, Eggleston’s journey finally reached its destination when the resurfaced snapshots were published in Los Alamos.

A collection of black and white photographic portraits by Laon Maybanke presenting the many expressions, gestures and faces of humanity.

Street photographs of scenes in Shanghai.

Through his own work, David Hicks offers examples of how to decorate bathrooms.
Vintage Fashion is an encyclopedic visual journey through women’s fashion that features more than 1,000 of the most remarkable vintage items ever sold on the resale market. Classified by decade and accompanied by the history of each item’s creation, the 850 articles of clothing and 150 bags depicted in this book offer a panoramic look across the evolution of style.
Incredible snapshot of the Drag scene during the late 1970s and early 1980s.
.jpg)
Special supplement to influential eighties men’s magazine Per Lui which featured the work of many well known fashion photographers through its time: Bruce Weber, Mario Testino, Herb Ritts, Steven Meisel amongst them. In this extended 80-page editorial, Bruce Weber and crew based out of the Shangri La Hotel in Los Angeles photographs a summer at the beach.

A book about architecture

Daniel Jack Lyons’ debut monograph continues the American artist’s long-term commitments to visualising the social and political rights of under-represented communities. Like a River is anthropological exploration of identity, transformation and coming-of-age amongst marginalised communities in the heart of the Amazon.

A comprehensive collection of photographs of garments made for the greatest Vivienne Westwood and Malcom McLaren collections, compiled from the archives of Hiroshi Fujiwara and Jun Takahashi – featuring clothing from Let It Rock, Sex, Seditionaries and World's End collections.

This publication brings together approximately 6,000 trademarks, focused on the period 1940–1980, to examine how modernist attitudes and imperatives gave birth to corporate identity.

Known as the poet of glamour and the man who adores women, Peter Lindbergh has been a driving force in the world of fashion and the evolution of the supermodel. This book features not only Lindberghs print photo campaigns but also the outtakes, Polaroids, and scouting photos of the photographers little films that have redefined fashion photography with their compelling realism and depth of emotion. The 250 color and duotone photos feature never-before-published images of Milla Jovovich, Kate Moss, Christy Turlington, Naomi Campbell, Helena Christensen, Cindy Crawford, and Amber Valletta.

A book on the people who came to America told through objects, prints and photographs at the Smithsonian Institution.

A wonderful monograph of the great British photographer, Cecil Beaton.

This books contains the many lives of Lee Miller – intimately recorded by her son, Anthony Penrose. From the archives, this book collates a rich selection of her best work – including portraits of her friends Picasso, Braque, Ernst, Eluard, Miró.

In this anthology, curator and director Catherine de Zegher compiles 25 influential essays on women artists from the numerous books she has written and edited throughout her career. Like many of de Zegher’s previous projects and books, Women’s Work Is Never Done promotes the feminine principle, showcasing the work of female artists from across the world. Featured artists include Martha Rossler, Anna Maria Maiolino, Anna Atkins, Hilma af Klint, Agnes Martin, Eva Hesse, Judith Wright, Simryn Gill and more.

Brassai became interested in the marginal art form of graffiti in the 1930s, seeing it as a form of outsider art that could open the door to new forms of artistic expression. His atmospheric photographs capture the essence of this unfettered creation. Stark contrasts of black and white alternate with softer shades of grey that meld into one another, smoothing the harsh gouges typical of graffiti.

A socialist journal of the social services. In this issue: visions from the left on the human services.

A book exploring the photographic worlds of surrealist artists Picasso, Miró, Dalí, and Tàpies.

Black in White America 1963-1965 is an expanded edition of Leonard Freed’s 1969 publication, Black in White America, published by Reel Art Press. Here, Michael D. Shulman, Magnum’s director of publishing and the book’s co-editor, introduces how the title was produced in consultation with the Freed Estate, providing an overview of the project’s striking images and their relevancy today.

This book offers an intimate look at the country’s most stylish offices, conference rooms, and dining spaces, belonging to figures such as David Rockefeller, Katharine Graham, and Halston. It highlights how each workspace reflects personal taste, from Estee Lauder’s romantic interiors to Oppenheimer & Co.’s sleek, executive designs.

This work, subtly homoerotic, draws from themes of the past rather than the present, resulting in an overall quality that is unbounded by the constraints of time. As Nan Goldin says on the back cover: "David has always used photography as a seductive device, a sublimation of his desire. His pictures of people feel so tactile because one senses his desire to touch but never in an aggressive or insistent way...He is intensely aware of the delicate balance of form in the shapes, the light, the relationship between person and place."
For Naked City, his first collection, photographer Weegee cruised the streets of 1940s New York in the early hours of the morning in search of the sensational.

Simultaneous Soloists is an artist's book emerging from the exhibition Anthony McCall: Solid Light Works and its accompanying performance series Four Simultaneous Soloists, organised by David Grubbs. It documents these ephemeral events through multiple means: an extensive conversation between McCall and Grubbs detailing a decade of working together. Simultaneous Soloists considers from a plurality of perspectives the challenge of combining McCall's visual art with sound in live performance.
.jpg)
Catalogue published on the occasion for the first ever retrospective of Wallace Berman's work. An enigmatic figure, Berman’s interests in the Kabbalah, music and poetry combined to make him a huge influence on a group of artists and poets of the Beat generation in the late 1950s and 1960s.

This book draws on the unparalleled collection of the Bauhaus-Archiv / Museum für Gestaltung to explore the movement’s legacy in art and architecture. Featuring works, sketches, and models, it highlights key figures such as Walter Gropius, Marcel Breuer, Wassily Kandinsky, and Paul Klee, while addressing its continuation in Chicago and Ulm.

In one decade, Tom Ford transformed a label known for providing clothing for traditional socialites into the sexiest, most decadent line imaginable. Sales exploded at Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent, creating the powerful luxury goods conglomerate that the Gucci Group is today. This book is a celebration of Tom Ford's design work for both Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent from 1994 to 2004, created with the designer’s full cooperation.

This book focuses on Ulises Carrión's personal and groundbreaking approach, managing to illustrate all aspects of his artistic and intellectual work. This includes books, magazines, videos, films, sound pieces, mail art, public projects, and performances, along with Carrión's initiatives as curator, editor, distributor, lecturer, archivist, art theorist, and write

Where is ‘69” Shinjuku Kaminari Zoku has taken on cult status in Japan and is almost impossible to find. The book contains numerous gritty black and white photographs documenting the Japanese biker gangs of Shinjuku in the late sixties. Fukuda has done an incredible job of capturing the life style surrounding this slice of pop history

A themed collection of Araki photographs. Issue 13: Xeroxed Photo Albums

Fashion Photography 1950-1975 is a book by German photographer F.C. Gundlach that showcases his iconic work during that period. His photos are known for blending social commentary with fashion, reflecting the spirit of the times and influencing fashion perception in Germany and beyond.

Otherworldly presents avant-garde garments, styling, fashion photography, and young designers who are reimagining fashion through new design technologies – from wearables to the utter transfiguration of the human silhouette. Otherworldly showcases a fashion avantgarde between futurism and fetish.

Published in conjunction with the 2010 exhibition Compost Pictures at the Charleston art centre in East Sussex, this artist’s book by Shafran continues his long-standing interest in the domestic environment as subject matter. Focusing on food waste collected in a kitchen compost bowl, the images reveal accidental arrangements of vegetables and utensils that resemble sculptural or installation-like compositions. This small, limited-edition, signed publication highlights the artist’s sharp observational eye and understated sense of humour.

This book documents 45 singles from The Mott Collection for the Kraftwerk 45RPM exhibition. Featuring iconic 45 RPM record covers, it highlights Kraftwerk’s distinctive aesthetic, capturing the tension between their analogue origins and the digital sensibilities that define their enduring influence.

Coco Chanel’s passion for fabulous jewels, for exceptional stones, and for improbable marvels produced pieces that were unparalleled in their insistence on luxury and refinement. Drawing inspiration from tradition, Chanel was never the slave of everyday formulas or market values. Yet she reinvented tradition in the most arresting and modern jewelry pieces, based on her love of colour and her assured command of austere classical beauty. This book is the first to present the remarkable jewellery work of Chanel.

A book of fashion and jewelry made from metal tabs pulled from beverage cans.

This book is an extenstion of a photography exhibition that took place at The Corcoran Gallery of Art in 1996.Featuring photographs by Jim Goldberg, Nan Goldin, Sally Mann, Jack Radcliffe, and Kathy Vargas, the images explore and communicate to the public the experience and meaning of hospice care. The approaches of the five artists vary substantially in their style and subject matter, ranging from dark and intense to images of smiles and loved ones.

Superhumanity seeks to explore and challenge our understanding of “design” by engaging with and departing from the concept of the “self.” This volume brings together more than fifty essays by leading scientists, artists, architects, designers, philosophers, historians, archaeologists, and anthropologists.

This catalogue accompanied the eleventh iteration of Sharjah Biennial. Re:Emerge Towards a New Cultural Cartography brought together artists, architects and musicians to reflect on themes of identity, migration, trade, cultural influence and synthesis.

This book is a study of fashion and the body which aims to establish the relations between codes and systems of clothing and the conduct of everyday life.
.jpg)
Published in 2001, "Alive" was Mario Testino’s third book in which the photographer shares moments from all his travels to exotic locales from magnificent cities by night. filled with models, celebrities and friends.

A book published from the exhibition of the same name held May 22 - June 16, 1976 of women artists from Paris. Features works by Bour, Hessie, Janicot, Maglione, and a collective work by Aballea, Blum, Croiset, Mimi, and Yalter.

Michael Cooper (1941–1973) was a British photographer who is remembered for his photographs of leading rock musicians of the 1960s and early 1970s, most notably the many photos he took of The Rolling Stones from 1963 to 1973. This book collect some of his photographs shot during the 1960s in London.
.jpg)
Drawing into Film: Directors Drawings is a 1993 book published alongside an exhibition showcasing the personal sketches, storyboards, and other drawings of various film directors, such as Alfred Hitchcock, Sergei Eisenstein, and David Lynch. Curated by Marc Glimcher and Mark Pollard for the Pace Gallery, it demonstrates how drawing is an integral part of a director's creative process for visualising ideas, from scripts and storyboards to character and set design

This comprehensive volume documents the design history of Braun, covering consumer electronics, photography equipment, watches, calculators, lighters, flashlights, personal care products, and household appliances. Richly illustrated with photographs, it traces Braun’s influential industrial design approach and its lasting impact on modern product aesthetics and functional innovation.

In this book, Mayall identified the dangers and difficulties created for machine operators by the increasing complexity of modern machines and examined the development of the "machine aesthetic" against social, technical and marketing factors. He also believed that organizing machines into coherent visual fields would help prevent accidents.

British Women Go to War documents the vital contributions of British women during the Second World War, covering their work in the armed forces, industry, the Women Land Army, and the Women's Voluntary Services. Featuring striking colour photographs by percy Hennel that show women in various roles during this period.

Long before Fotografias, Peter Fischli and David Weiss were already known for undermining distinctions between high and low art, as Nancy Spector observed. This collection of underexposed black-and-white photographs reimagines low-end figurative imagery as murky, atmospheric snapshots, transforming familiar landscapes, historical scenes, animals, mythological figures, and female subjects into subtly reframed works of fine art.

This book explores topics such as the morals of city planning and affordable housing, rehabilitation and education, public vs private space, and the desire to strengthen inner-city communities.

The book is the intended outcome of the Royal Mail Millennium Stamps project and is a wonderful celebration of British art and design.

A substantial selection of Stanley's fiction over the past ten years or so, this book shows a contemporary master of the micro narrative. Apocalyptic, funny, unsettling and hallucinogenic in their intensity, Stanley Donwood's stories present a series of haunting episodes in a world drained of meaning, sense and consequence.

First published in 1954, Das Auge der Liebe (The Eye of Love) by the Swiss photographer René Groebli is a small book featuring images that were made during the honeymoon with his wife Rita in France.

GA Document is a Global Architecture focusing on contemporary international architecture and design projects.

A remarkable collection of photographs taken by Dennis Hopper before he directed Easy Rider, this is a portrait of the decade made from Hopper's unique position within the art and entertainment world of the time.

Richly reproduced colour illustrations alongside interviews that explore multiple dimensions of female sexuality. Through a blend of visual and textual material, the book offers an in-depth, reflective examination of intimacy, identity, and representation within contemporary photographic and cultural discourse.

Trains and steamships transformed transportation in the mid-19th century and opened the world to a new breed of traveler. Louis Vuitton understood the need for more practical luggage, and strove to create products that were adaptable to all situations--and the travel trunk was born.

A collection of male nudes of one male model in many different costumes, shot by Charlotte March.

This book is a photographic celebration of the Hajj pilgrimage – an annual Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca, Saudi Arabia, the holiest city for Muslims. Newsha Tavakolian's remarkable photography is reproduced here with full captions that detail the events and rituals that form part of the pilgrimage.

A photographic exploration of the confluence of art, fashion and fetish in the cult of high heels swooping down fashion show runways and city streets. With photographic contributions by Glen Luchford, Robert Mapplethorpe, Martin Parr, Guy Bourdin, Juergen Teller, Araki, Bruce Gilden, Peter Hujar, et al.

This subtle yet powerful book of photographs blends evocative scenes from the many subcultures of Iturbide's native Mexico with the artist's own deeply personal, and oftentimes Surrealistic, vision.

Description goes here

Get Rid of Meaning is a comprehensive compendium on the work, life, and legacy of Kathy Acker, one of the most influential figures in transgressive autofiction. Situating her writing within postwar experimental traditions, the volume explores her radical blend of literature, theory, and visual culture. It includes archival material, cut-up notebooks, correspondence, and essays that trace her connections to avant-garde art scenes in New York and California, as well as her lasting influence on contemporary writers and thinkers.

The Heartbeat of Fashion presents photographs from the FC Gundlach collection from 1860 to 2006 and features photography that documents the image of people through their external appearance: fashions, poses, facial expression and gestures - featuring works from Diane Arbus, Irving Penn, Richard Avedon, Guy Bourdin, Robert Mapplethorpe, Peter Lindbergh, Wolfgang Tillmans, and more.

Francesca Woodman: On Being an Angel offers a comprehensive overview of Woodman’s oeuvre, organized chronologically, with texts by Anna Tellgren, Anna-Karin Palm and the artist’s father, George Woodman.

Richard Rogers explores modern architecture

In oversized photos and full colour, this lavish book presents a stunning collection of clothing designs by Dolce & Gabbana, providing a comprehensive view of the Houses' best work – with anecdotes from famous fans of D&G including Isabella Rossellini, Cindy Crawford, Madonna, and Demi Moore.


A selection of photographs of one of the most distinguished practitioners of portrait and fashion photography. Published in conjunction with an exhibition at The Museum of Modern Art, this catalogue was the first comprehensive retrospective of Irving Penn's work.

A Lebanese Archive is based on a collection of archival photographs from Lebanon and the Middle East which came into the hands of Ania Dabrowska in 2010 when she was a SPACE artist-in-residence at Arlington hostel in Camden, London. It belongs to Diab Alkarssifi, a Lebanese emigre who was living there at the time. The images were taken and collected by Alkarssifi over a lifetime. It was a chance encounter that gave birth to the archiving of a huge collection, and the developmen of a new body of work by Dabrowska - published here for the first time.

A collection of photographs by David Hockney, published in 1982 for the exhibition of the same name at the Centre Pompidou in Paris.

A unique album of photographs featuring Peter Johnson, an athlete turned muse Weber discovered on location at a wrestling camp in Iowa. Taken over four consecutive years, the photographs show the evolution from adolescence to manhood, as Johnson is seen in various states of dress and undress, in diverse locations around the world. Includes brief texts by Walt Whitman, Robert Frost, T.E. Lawrence, Shel Silverstein, and Bruce Springsteen.

Issey Miyake: East Meets West features an impressive contrast of designs influenced by both Eastern and Western cultures. East Meets West was the first ever monograph that was created about the living fashion designer, and its importance is unquestionable. With over 200 pages of full bleed color images featuring some of Issey Miyake’s colorful clothing, the book truthfully depicts the designer’s passion for design, culture, and authenticity. Featuring editorial photos shot by the likes of Noriaki Yokosuka to the capturing of runway spectacles that combine movement with clothing.

Miguel Milá: A Life in Design is a detailed look back through most emblematic works of interior designer Miguel Milá, produced between 1956 and 2021, with archival photos and drawings, as well as original photos shot at Milá’s Barcelona home by Nacho Alegre.

A book about architecture

A intriguing look into Maholy Nagy's photographs and photograms.

Auto-Destructive Art revisits Gustav Metzger’s radical 1965 lecture, presenting art as both creative practice and revolutionary social action. Republished 50 years later, this facsimile edition renews Metzger’s powerful critique of war, technological domination, and society’s fixation on destruction—issues that remain strikingly relevant today.

An insightful sociological typology, this work presents documentary black-and-white portraits of Japanese seventeen-year-olds taken between March 1987 and January 1988. Through a restrained, observational approach, it captures a nuanced portrait of adolescence during a specific cultural moment, rendered with clarity and quiet documentary precision.

Howard Dearstyne was an architect who studied at the Bauhaus from 1928 to 1933. This book offers an his insider look at the Bauhaus movement, and discusses the courses, workshops, and teachers.
.jpg)
This book, the title of which translates to, "The Novel of François Truffaut", is a collective work published shortly after the director's death. Across 239 pages book, you will find black and white photographs of the director, his films along with essays.

Twenty young people aged 14-18 were selected to edit the School Kids Issue (Issue 28) of Oz. They were given editorial freedom, resulting in a mixture of articles and cartoon strips that communicated their view on music, sexual freedom, hypocrisy, drug use, corporal punishment, and education. It caused an outrage, and the editors were charged with obscenity and conspiring to 'debauch and corrupt the morals of young children'. However, after an outcry by supporters and anti-censorship campaigners, the verdict was overturned at appeal.
The Library
Our Library is the heart of Reference Point and from where all other elements take their philosophy and context. An evolving and growing collection of rare books, ephemera and printed matter focused on Post-War Radical Art, Architecture, Design, Fashion and Culture. The library exists to create inspiration and conversation, and provide creatives of all stages and disciplines reference points for their projects.
Our librarians are always on hand to serve as research assistants but you can also email us with your interests and project brief and we can prepare a selection of works in advance of your visit.
Reference Point
2 Arundel Street
WC2R 3DA, London