This title was first published in 2002. Photographs are ubiquitous in our lives. Most of us contribute to making some of the billions of photographs produced each year. A small number of these have qualities that capture and sustain aesthetic interest. What distinguishes such photographic art from all the other kinds of photograph? What constitutes the distinctive value of photographic art? These are the opening questions of this book, a comprehensive and distinctively philosophical exploration of the aesthetic significance of photography. Identifying the distinctive aesthetic qualities of photographic art, this book explores their nature and value. The explanation of photographic art is complemented by reflection on the nature of aesthetic theory, its role in the history of theorizing about photography and its relation to other interpretative and critical approaches to explaining photographic art. The result is a rounded defence of a distinctively philosophical aesthetics of photography and an original aesthetic theory of photographic art. Illustrated throughout with photographic examples, this book offers those interested in film, photographic art, aesthetics and art theory an introduction and deeper exploration of the field.