The Camera

What does the camera see? How can we trust a selfie? Photography is about light and depth of field, and poses. An object can become more beautiful or uglier: a matter of cropping, modifying, trying to make the viewer see what the photographer wanted to depict.  A new-born baby in his mother’s arms amidst a cluster of manned battle-tanks in Afghanistan can make war tender; a revolver caught as a gust of wind lifts the jacket of a bodyguard at a wedding can make a happy event sinister.

Words are important too when a photo is published in a newspaper, or magazine, offline or online; a caption can alter the perception. There is no truth.

The camera is just as capable of lying as the typewriter.
— Bertolt Brecht