Reading about the photographers is more interesting than reading about their work. Same for most artists I think.
For once, I totally agree with you.
It's a point I made a couple of years ago, here on LuLa, about finding all those how-to videos of some guy pontificating about his photography quite lacking in interest (for me). Watching somebody else shoot or print tells you very little that looking at his pictures doesn't show you already. Technique is just that: it's a cold fish that gives you neither the same mindset nor skills inherent in the guy you might be watching with huge round eyes.
I do look at whatever videos I can find that feature Peter Lindbergh; I don't do that in the crazy hope of getting his gigs; I don't do it in the hope of learning very much. I do it because the team that makes those videos makes a product that, of itself, is fascinating for somebody who has worked in that genre of photography. In fact, the videos attract me much more than do the stills that can be found online or in the magazines. The appeal (of the vids) is in the chat, the throw-aways; the sense of
something happening that is absent from the stilted "instructive" interview. And most I've seen are, unfortunately, stilted.
An interview with a clever reporter, digging into Bailey or anybody else you like, brings so much more of personality into the open, and that's the part that images are seldom capable of revealing to the same depth, being limited by ability, the reality before the camera, and all the things that get between author and product. In other words, a good book or interview brings out the character that leads to the making of the works, and perhaps illuminates the reasons for their pictures being as they are.
So yeah, it really is about people, whatever they produce.
