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James, son of the war artist Eric Ravilious, inherited his father's artistic talents. Although he was a gifted painter, his main career was to be as a photographer. After a false start studying accountancy and deciding it was not for him, and then trying to make his way as a painter like his father before him, in 1972 he and his family moved from London to North Devon, his wife Robin's childhood home. His appetite had already been whetted by seeing an exhibition of the work of Henri Cartier-Bresson. Now, in their new home, he was employed by the Beaford Centre to start a photographic archive recording the landscape and people of the area. His widow, who worked closely with him, has simultaneously published a biography, James Ravilious: A Life, to which this splendid book is a companion volume. [[The Recent Past by James Ravilious|Full Review]]