Martin Parr - Common Sense - 1996

This copy SIGNED by Martin Parr on title page.

The book is renowned for its unmistakable aesthetic choices that emphasize the artificiality of modern life. Parr utilizes macro lenses to isolate tightly cropped, forensic details of ordinary items. Shot on 35mm high-saturation film with harsh, direct flash, the images pop with "lurid and luscious" garish color. The book is meticulously constructed with double-page spreads, placing images side-by-side to create an ironic, punchy dialogue between commonplace objects.

Through 158 color photographs, Common Sense documents a disposable, over-the-top "smorgasbord" of Western excess. Recurring imagery includes oversized donuts clutched by children, greasy plates overflowing with fried food, and heavily iced cakes. It captures cheap souvenirs, dime-store combs, cigarette butts, and piles of plastic merchandise. Parr looks closely at heavy makeup, garish clothes, tacky jewelry, and people engaging in aggressive leisure. The title plays on "common" meaning both everywhere (universal) and vulgar. The cover itself—a piggy-bank shaped like a globe—underlines the theme of the planet treated as a giant money box.

The launch of the book coincided with an unprecedented exhibition staged simultaneously in over 40 cities across 17 countries, earning Parr a Guinness World Record for the largest simultaneous photography exhibition by a single artist. It remains one of Parr's most celebrated and biting masterpieces of contemporary social satire.