A new book by Luther College professor Aaron Lurth asks readers in Decorah to look at film cameras as more than mechanical objects. Small Luxuries: Film Cameras is a 128-page illustrated history that connects camera design, companies and technology with American culture, major historical events and the people whose lives were influenced by images.
Lurth, a visual communication professor and director of Luther’s visual communication program, published the book Aug. 4 through the Quarto Group. The hardcover is available to Decorah residents through the Luther Book Shop or online, according to Luther College News.
A visual history, not a buying guide
The book includes an introduction to basic camera mechanics, but its primary focus is historical and cultural rather than shopping advice or detailed equipment specifications. Lurth examines major manufacturers, notable models and influential figures to show how photographic products became significant.
Designed in a coffee-table format, Small Luxuries combines photographs, illustrations, vintage advertisements, newspaper clippings and other visual materials. About one-third of the images were sourced and photographed by Lurth, using cameras he owns or was able to access.
Among the oldest cameras he photographed was a 1909 Kodak No. 3A Folding Brownie. That research and firsthand photography give readers interested in photography, graphic design and cultural history a closer look at how camera companies developed and why particular products mattered.
Camera history meets world events
One of the book’s central stories concerns Leica, the German camera company. During the 1930s, Leica owner Ernst Leitz II helped approximately 300 Jewish people leave Nazi Germany by assigning them to offices in France, Great Britain, Hong Kong and the United States under the appearance of Leica employment.
The effort later became known as the Leica Freedom Train. Lurth uses the episode to demonstrate how camera history can intersect with world events and the experiences of people affected by them—not only with technological innovation or industrial design.
Lurth’s visual storytelling background
Lurth earned a bachelor’s degree in art from Luther College in 2008 and a Master of Fine Arts degree in photography and graphic design from the University of Iowa in 2012. He later returned to Luther as a professor of art and visual communication.
His photography has appeared in projects associated with National Geographic, ABC, NBC, MTV.com, Time, the Des Moines Register, General Electric, CNET.com, the Red Cross and The Iowa Review. His films have screened at more than 100 festivals worldwide and received several awards, including the Iowa Motion Picture Association’s Best Documentary film.
In 2022, two of Lurth’s photographs entered the permanent collection of the Figge Art Museum in Davenport. With Small Luxuries: Film Cameras, the Luther professor extends that visual storytelling work into a history of the cameras, companies and people that helped shape how the world records and understands images.