Man Ray's first monograph, a presentation copy inscribed: 'à Marcel Duhamel - / les photos sont des objets à retardement / mais les plus durables - / with love / Man Ray'. ['Photographs are time-delayed objects, but the most durable ones.']

Marcel Duhamel (1900–1977) was a French actor and screenwriter, and founder of the Série noire imprint published by Gallimard, which issued hardboiled detective thrillers by authors including Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, Horace McCoy, William R. Burnett, Ed McBain, Chester Himes, Lou Cameron, Jim Thompson, and Peter Cheyney.

During the 1920s, Duhamel regularly hosted members of the Surrealist group, including Man Ray, at his house at 54 rue de Château in Montparnasse. It was here, according to André Breton, that they devised the game 'Exquisite Corpse', in which a piece of paper is passed from person to person, folded to conceal each previous contribution.

Man Ray had hoped that royalties from the sale of this book would enable him to make a long-overdue trip back to New York. Photographs... was well received in France, but in the United States, the reception was distinctly less enthusiastic. Lewis Mumford wrote in The New Yorker that Man Ray had 'done almost everything with a camera, except use it to take photographs... photographing Calla lilies so that they will look like drawings by a second-rate academician.' Commercially, it was not a success. It is widely suggested that in an attempt to generate sales, the publishers recalled the book and replaced the original title page with one stating 'deuxième édition'. The favourable reception in France also led to the 'second edition' being titled in French with attention drawn to the other contributors: Man Ray. Photographies 1920-1934 Paris avec un portrait par Picasso – textes de André Breton Paul Eluard Rrose Sélavy Tristan Tzara –préface par Man Ray.

First edition, second issue with the title page citing the publisher's fictitious claim of a 'second edition'; (384 x 312 mm, 15 x 12¼ in); black & white photographs printed in gravure by The Néogravure Company, texts in English and French by Man Ray, Paul Eluard, Andre Breton, Tristan Tzara, Rrose Selavy [Marcel Duchamp], nick and crease to title-page; colour photo-illustrated covers, with a plastic comb binding by Draeger Frères, light wear, rubbing and marking to lower side, shallow crease to corner, top and bottom tabs torn, a very good copy; [vi], 1-24, [2], 25-42, [2], 43-66, [2], 67-84, [2], 85-104, [2].

Regards sur un siècle de photographie à travers le Livre 47; The Book of 101 Books: Seminal Photographic Books of the Twentieth Century pp80-1; 802 books from the Auer Collection p225; Paris, Les livres de photographies 1920-1950 pp148-51.