This book is divided into five chapters, plus and introduction that relates the work to other photography, both contemporary and historical. The subject of the first chapter is narrative tableaux -- scenes that tell stories, whether shocking, poignant, or mysterious -- by artists ranging from Joel-Peter Witkin to Eileen Cowin and Laurie Simmons. Portraits and self-portraits constitute the next chapter, with fictional personalities created by Cindy Sherman and others, as well as complex constructions by Lucas Samaras, Chuck Close, and Nancy Burson. Chapter three focuses on still lifes of all types, fabricated to be photographed by artists as dissimilar as Barbara Kasten, James Casebere, and Frank Majore. Various appropriators, including Barbara Kruger, Richard Prince, and Sherrie Levine, critique the icons of contemporary society in the fourth chapter. The fifth concentrates on the imaginitive ways that artists David Hockney, Jerry Uelsmann, Betty Hahn and others manipulate the physical elements of photography to produce unprecedented results."