Academy Award-winning documentarian filmmaker Errol Morris (Tabloid; The Thin Blue Line), brings an unusual perspective to Believing Is Seeing: Observations on the Mysteries of Photography--his first book, a collection of essays--that investigates the relationship between photographs and reality.
Two childhood experiences that deeply affected Morris influenced his approach to the subject. His father died when he was very young, and Morris would come to know him (later) only through studying photographic images of him. Morris also suffered an eye ailment, which ultimately altered his visual perceptions. Thus, an inquisitive, skeptical visual philosopher emerged. It is no wonder that Morris has undertaken a forensic examination that explores how photographs have the power to reveal and conceal and thereby convey certain truths and frauds.
Morris dissects notable documentary photographs--a photograph of three children discovered in the hand of a unknown soldier in Gettysburg; cannonballs on a landscape during the Crimean War; children's toys photographed amid the rubble of the Israeli-Lebanese War; the iconic image of the hooded man that emerged from Abu Ghraib, among others. The book delves into the intentions of a photographer in relation to images themselves; how photography can be manipulated and used as propaganda; how words that accompany a photograph can change visual context; and even how photographs can serve as a source of memory. With fascinating insight, Morris investigates and interviews experts in the visual arts, as if putting each notable photographic specimen on trial and encouraging readers to render their own verdicts. --Kathleen Gerard, blogger at Reading Between the Lines