Starburst: Color Photography in America 1970-1980 offers the first historical survey of what critics in the seventies called "The New Color Photography." Conservative critics saw this controversial color photography, which was featured in many exhibitions and essays throughout the decade, as an assault on established standards for black-and-white art photography, while others recognized in work by William Eggleston, Stephen Shore, and others an approach informed by photography's ubiquitous role in contemporary lite.

Addressing various themes, such as the technological factors contributing to color's emergence, cultural biases against color photography's use as an art form, and shifting attitudes between formalist and conceptual practices, authors Kevin Moore, James Crump, and Leo Rubinfien explore color's role in the transition between modern and contemporary approaches to art photography during the seventies.