Act One: A Century in the Making is a landmark photographic and cultural portrait of the first quarter of the 21st century, bringing together more than 100 internationally recognized photographers and original essays by leading scholars, journalists, historians, and public intellectuals.
Spanning more than 700 pages, the book examines the forces, events, and lived experiences that have shaped the contemporary world. Through powerful photography and critical reflection, Act One explores climate change, public health, human rights, deindustrialization, democracy, race in America, war and conflict, globalization, geopolitics, and technology—offering a sweeping portrait of a century still in the making.
Each chapter opens with an original essay that provides historical context, analysis, and perspective before giving way to carefully curated photographic narratives. Together, image and text create a dialogue between global events and personal experience, revealing how large-scale political, environmental, social, and technological transformations are lived by individuals and communities around the world.
Contributors include Pulitzer Prize winners, Guggenheim Fellows, Fulbright Scholars, recipients of the W. Eugene Smith Grant, National Endowment for the Arts grantees, and many of the most influential photographers working today. Their photographs are joined by essays from leading voices in fields including history, journalism, public health, human rights, technology, climate science, race, democracy, and international affairs.
Rather than offering a single narrative, Act One embraces complexity. It moves between conflict zones and classrooms, hospitals and courtrooms, factories and neighborhoods, landscapes transformed by climate change and societies reshaped by technology. The result is a multifaceted portrait of a world undergoing profound change.
At once a photography book, a work of contemporary history, and a reflection on the defining issues of our time, Act One: A Century in the Making invites readers to consider not only what has happened during the opening decades of the century, but how those events continue to shape the future.
Published in conjunction with a major exhibition, Act One stands as an ambitious record of our era and a testament to the enduring power of photography to help us understand the world and our place within it.
Other Side Editions is an independent, non-profit publishing house dedicated to photography, visual culture, and contemporary thought. Founded on the belief that books are spaces for inquiry, reflection, and cultural dialogue, the press develops publications that bring together compelling visual work, strong editorial vision, and thoughtful design.
Working across photography, art, history, culture, and social issues, Other Side Editions publishes projects that explore the complexities of contemporary life while grounded in the enduring power of the printed book. As an independent non-profit publisher, its focus is not driven by commercial trends, but by a commitment to work of lasting artistic, intellectual, and cultural significance.
Central to the publisher's approach is the belief that meaning emerges not only through individual images or texts, but through the relationships between them. Sequence, rhythm, pacing, typography, design, and material form are treated as essential components of the reading experience. Each publication is developed in collaboration with artists, photographers, writers, and designers, guided by editorial rigor, visual sensitivity, and a commitment to enduring form.
Rather than viewing the book simply as a container for content, Other Side Editions approaches publishing as a creative and intellectual practice. From concept development and editing to sequencing, design, and production, each project is shaped as a cohesive work intended to reward engagement over time.
The press is drawn to projects with distinct visual languages that engage culture, memory, identity, landscape, history, and personal experience with depth, originality, and formal clarity. Its interests span culturally expansive narratives and intimate personal works, united by artistic vision and emotional resonance.
Act One: A Century in the Making, the inaugural publication of Other Side Editions, reflects this mission by bringing together more than 100 internationally recognized photographers and leading scholars in a multidisciplinary examination of the first quarter of the 21st century. Through projects like Act One, Other Side Editions seeks to create publications that contribute to public discourse while remaining enduring works of art, scholarship, and cultural record.
Joshua Herman is the Editorial Director of Act One: A Century in the Making and the founding Editorial Director of Other Side Editions, a publishing house dedicated to photography, visual culture, and contemporary thought.
Herman conceived Act One as an ambitious examination of the first quarter of the 21st century through photography and original essays. He developed the book's overall editorial vision, thematic structure, and narrative framework, organizing the publication around a series of interconnected subjects including climate change, public health, human rights, deindustrialization, democracy, race in America, war and conflict, globalization, and technology.
As Editorial Director, Herman assembled and collaborated closely with the project's contributing scholars, writers, and public intellectuals, helping shape the intellectual foundation of the publication while serving as the principal editorial collaborator throughout the development of their essays. He also oversaw the conceptual flow of the book, working to create meaningful dialogue between photography and text, individual stories and larger historical forces.
In addition to directing the publication's broader editorial development, Herman wrote and edited the photographic essays that accompany the visual sections of the book. Through sequencing, narrative structure, and editorial integration, he helped bring together the work of more than one hundred internationally recognized photographers and multiple essayists into a unified volume.
Before founding Other Side Editions, Herman spent more than fifteen years building platforms and initiatives within the visual arts, publishing, and creative industries. His work has focused on connecting artists, photographers, institutions, and audiences through projects that combine cultural significance with broad public engagement.
Through Other Side Editions, Herman's mission is to develop publications that unite artistic excellence, intellectual inquiry, and lasting cultural value. He approaches the book as more than a container for images and ideas, viewing it instead as a space where narrative, design, photography, and scholarship converge to create meaningful and enduring cultural experiences.
Marc Asnin is the Creative & Visual Director of Act One: A Century in the Making and serves as the project's Concept and Curatorial Director of Photography. An award-winning documentary photographer, Asnin brings decades of experience in image-making, editing, and visual storytelling to the publication.
For Act One, Asnin assembled and curated the work of more than 100 internationally recognized photographers working across documentary, fine art, conceptual, portrait, and journalistic traditions. Drawing upon the strengths of each approach, he developed a visual framework that reflects the complexity, diversity, and contradictions of the first quarter of the 21st century.
Working closely with photographers and collaborators, Asnin helped shape the publication's visual identity through editing, sequencing, and curatorial direction. His approach emphasizes the relationship between individual images and larger photographic narratives, creating visual conversations that move between personal experience and global events, intimate moments and historical forces.
Central to Asnin's vision for Act One was the belief that the story of the 21st century could only be told through a plurality of voices and photographic approaches. He brought together photographers whose work spans conflict, climate, culture, identity, politics, landscape, portraiture, and everyday life, creating a visual dialogue that reflects both the fragmentation and interconnectedness of the contemporary era.
As Creative & Visual Director, Asnin oversaw the selection, organization, and sequencing of images throughout the publication. His goal was not simply to assemble a collection of photographs, but to create a cohesive visual experience that reflects the political, cultural, environmental, and human realities that have shaped contemporary life.
In addition to his role on Act One, Asnin serves as Creative & Visual Director for Other Side Editions, where he collaborates with photographers and artists to develop visually driven publications that unite strong editorial vision with thoughtful design.
Jon Lee Anderson is the author of the introduction to Act One: A Century in the Making. An internationally acclaimed journalist, author, and staff writer for The New Yorker, Anderson is widely regarded as one of the foremost chroniclers of conflict, politics, and social change in the modern era.
Over the course of a career spanning more than four decades, Anderson has reported from some of the most consequential events and regions of the contemporary world, including conflicts, revolutions, humanitarian crises, and political transitions across Latin America, the Middle East, Africa, Europe, and Asia. His work is distinguished by its depth of reporting, historical perspective, and close attention to the human stories that unfold within larger geopolitical events.
Anderson is the author of numerous books, including the acclaimed biography Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life, considered one of the definitive works on the iconic revolutionary figure. His reporting and writing have earned international recognition for their insight, rigor, and commitment to bearing witness to the complexities of contemporary history.
For Act One, Anderson contributes an introduction that reflects on the opening decades of the 21st century and the profound transformations that have shaped the world during this period. Drawing upon a lifetime spent documenting conflict, political upheaval, and social change, he offers a perspective that situates the themes explored throughout the book within a broader historical and human context.
His contribution serves as an invitation into the publication's larger exploration of climate change, democracy, race, technology, public health, human rights, globalization, and war, helping frame the questions that animate both the essays and photographs that follow.
As one of the most respected journalists of his generation, Anderson's work embodies a belief that understanding history requires both careful observation and deep engagement with the people who live through it. His introduction establishes the tone for a publication dedicated to examining the first quarter of the 21st century through photography, scholarship, and lived experience.
