Stevens, Jane Alden. Tears of Stone: World War I Remembered by Jane Alden Stevens.

Stevens, 2004, with funding from the Ohio Arts Council, et al.  Like new in stiff illustrated wraps with custom made 4-mil polyester jacket.  (Jacket not illustrated in photos accompanying this listing.) 127 pages with black and white panoramic format photographs, some taken with pinhole, of cemeteries and other sites in Belgium, England, France, and Germany by Stevens, with her essay and biographical information.  Foreword by Donovan Webster.   Summary:

Tears of Stone: World War I Remembered by Jane Alden Stevens is a poignant photographic book that reflects on the lasting physical and emotional impact of the First World War through evocative black-and-white images taken at former battlefields, cemeteries, memorials, and sites of remembrance across Europe.

📘 Overview
Stevens spent nearly two years traveling to key locations in Belgium, Great Britain, Germany, and France where some of the most devastating battles of World War I were fought. Her book is the result of this extended project, combining her photography with brief essays and, viewers’ reflections in English, German, and French.

📷 Photographic Focus
The images in Tears of Stone document both landscapes still marked by war’s devastation — scarred fields, pock-marked earth, abandoned villages — and the ways people continue to remember the fallen. Photographs include memorials and sculptural monuments as well as objects and traces left by families and visitors, showing how memory and mourning endure over time.

🕊️ Themes and Perspective

Memory and Loss: The book probes the persistence of memory and how nations and individuals commemorate collective suffering and sacrifice decades after the conflict ended.

Human Presence in Landscape: Stevens’ images capture both the remnants of war’s destruction and the human acts of remembrance — silent pilgrimages, inscriptions, and tributes that honor the dead.

Reflection on War’s Legacy: Through stark, resonant photography, the book invites viewers to contemplate not only the historic events of World War I but also the universal emotional responses to loss, grief, and the passage of time.

🧠 Impact
Tears of Stone serves as a visual memorial and a meditation on collective memory, bridging past and present by showing that the scars of war — both on the land and in human consciousness — persist long after the fighting has ended.

Jane Alden Stevens is an American fine art photographer, educator, and author known for thematic photographic narratives that explore history, human experience, and cultural relationships. Born in Rochester, New York, she earned a BA in 19th-Century European Studies from St. Lawrence University and an MFA in photography from the Rochester Institute of Technology. Stevens spent over three decades as a professor in the College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning at the University of Cincinnati, where she is currently (2026) Professor Emerita of Fine Arts. Her major body of work includes acclaimed projects such as Tears of Stone: World War I Remembered, which documents the lasting physical and emotional marks of World War I across Europe, and Seeking Perfection, a series focusing on traditional apple cultivation in Japan. A co-author of the textbook Teaching Photography (2015), Stevens has exhibited her work globally, and her photographs are preserved in permanent collections including the George Eastman Museum, the Cincinnati Art Museum, and the Harry Ransom Center.