An accessible, sweeping survey of the history of photography. Photography has been one of the key languages of modernity and, since the advent of the digital revolution, has also established itself as the most used medium in everyday private and public communication.

This book illustrates the captivating adventure of world photography from its origins to the present day in an accessible, exacting and narrative tone that will appeal to experts, amateurs and photography enthusiasts alike. Setting off from the medium's pioneers and early protagonists, this volume traces the spread of photography in all ambits (scientific, forensic and artistic), the development of portraiture, the advent of early 19th-century avant-gardes, the use of photography as record, reportage and propaganda, its contribution to Pop and Conceptual art, the steps toward its institutionalization and, lastly, its most recent developments, from staged photography to new millennium post-photography.