Photography and reality are inextricably linked but, whether one is being photographed, making a photograph, or looking at a photograph, photography is an act of the imagination. In nine original essays, art historians and cultural theorists break with photographic tradition to explore the crucial role of the imagination in photography from nineteenth-century studio portraiture to twenty-first-century digital innovations.

Drawing on the twenty-nine exhibitions of Le Mois de la Photo à Montréal 2005, Image & Imagination features the work of sixty contemporary artists from Canada, Australia, the United States, France, England, Haiti, and Japan, including Marc Audette, Iain Baxter, Diane Borsato, Denis Farley, Alain Bublex, Michel Campeau, Destiny Deacon, Evergon, Adad Hannah, David Hlynsky, Tracey Moffatt, Shana and Robert ParkeHarrison, Lynne Marsh, Polixeni Papapetrou, Martin Parr, Ramona Ramlochand, Carolee Schneemann, Michael Snow, and Hulleah J. Tsinhnahjinnie.

Essayists include Geoffrey Batchen (City University of New York), Catherine Bédard (Canadian Cultural Centre, Paris), Fae Brauer (University of New South Wales), Francine Dagenais (McGill University), Martyn Jolly (Australian National University), Petra Halkes (Concordia University), Martha Langford (Concordia University), Kirsty Robertson (Queen's University), and Ian Walker (University of Wales College).