The American South is the most mysterious and fascinating region of the United States. It has given rise to a particular history, which has been documented in the last hundred and thirty years by some of our most illustrious photographers, among them George N. Barnard, William Eggleston, Walker Evans, Arnold Genthe, Frances Benjamin Johnston, Clarence John Laughlin, Sally Mann, Charles Moore, and Carrie Mae Weems.

In Picturing the South: 1860 to the Present, the High Museum of Art in Atlanta has brought together more than 160 photographs taken since the Civil War era. This assembly documents the South's cultural heritage and psychological identity, as well as its transformation from a land decimated by war to the bustling New South of today.

1. In addition to the remarkable pictures by photographers from around the South and around the world, the book includes evocative essays by Southern writers William Baldwin, Clyde Edgerton, Josephine Humphreys, Bobbie Ann Mason, Willie Morris, and A. J. Verdelle. Combining the haunting and the humorous, the exquisite and the electrifying, the words and images in Picturing the South capture the distinctive beauty and character of the American South.