Overview

One man’s power to capture his world in all its colours, surprises, and troubles. Since the moment William Ferris’s parents gave their twelve-year-oldson a Kodak Brownie Hawkeye camera for Christmas in 1954, Ferris passionatelybegan to photograph his world. He has never stopped. The sixtiesand seventies were a particularly significant period for Ferris as he becamea pathbreaking documentarian of the American South. This beautiful,provocative collection of 100 of Ferris’s photographs of the South, takenduring this formative period, capture the power of his color photography.Color film, as Ferris points out in the book’s introduction, was not commonlyused by documentarians during the latter half of the twentieth century,but Ferris found color to work in significant ways in the photographicjournals he created of his world in all its permutations and surprises. The volume opens with images of his family’s farm and its workers—family and hired—southeast of Vicksburg, Mississippi. The images are atonce lyrical and troubling. As Ferris continued to photograph people andtheir homes, churches, and blues clubs, their handmade signs and folk art,and the roads that wound through the region, divisive racial landscapesbecome part of the record. A foreword by Tom Rankin, professor of visualstudies and former director of the Center for Documentary Studies atDuke University, provides rich insight into Ferris’s work.

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9781469629681

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Reviews

With this book, Ferris hopes he can connect readers of today to the 'intimate worlds' of a bygone era in rural Mississippi.--<i>The Pilot</i>

Reveals Ferris's natural and direct eye, with each section growing in narrative power and scope. . . . Lyrical and sensitive, the photos reveal a dichotomy between tradition and change, rich and poor, black and white, tracking race relations in the South.-- Publishers Weekly

[Ferris's] photos and commentary expose rural nature, African-American culture, country stores and everything in between. It speaks of the hospitality, the art and the unique lifestyle of Southerners.--<i>Daily Mississippian</i>

For Ferris, each photo tells a story.--Vicksburg Post Captures [a] vanishing place. . . . Striking. . . . Ferris is catching a moment of transition. . . . Much of Ferris' imagery seems timeless.--Ben Steelman, Wilmington Star-News A visual journal boasting 103 photographs of the region's idiosyncratic characters and landscapes.--Atlanta Journal-Constitution The images are singular, never redundant, each building quietly and powerfully upon those before it.--Memphis Commercial Appeal Starting with [Ferris's] boyhood days on his family's farm near Vicksburg, Mississippi, the book includes vivid portraits of the region's people and buildings and reflects his ambivalent relationship with the 'beautiful and haunting worlds that always surround me.'--Pennsylvania Gazette At first glance, The South in Color may appear to be a book about the difference between its subjects; for author Bill Ferris, it is about what makes them the same. Indeed, while turning through its pages, a strong sense of time, place and connection are impossible to ignore.--Chapel Hill Magazine With this book, Ferris hopes he can connect readers of today to the 'intimate worlds' of a bygone era in rural Mississippi.--The Pilot Bill Ferris has taught a lot of people how to embrace Southern culture. . . . Now he's showing us what he loves in photographs.--Daily Beast William Ferris offers us a huge gift, by taking us into such a personal trip.--Blues Magazine [Ferris's] photos and commentary expose rural nature, African-American culture, country stores and everything in between. It speaks of the hospitality, the art and the unique lifestyle of Southerners.--Daily Mississippian [Ferris] distills his formative decades, the 1960s and '70s, into plain-spoken poetry about what life feels like in his more intimate, equitable and interconnected South. . . . In these images, Ferris' use of color shines. . . . His characters transcend the labels of black and white or have and have-not, granted a documentary pedestal from which they say their own pieces in their own voices.--Julian Rankin, The Clarion-Ledger An insightful exploration of the American South. . . Illuminates Ferris's understanding of race, culture, and community in the South.--Valley Voices Provides an honest and open perspective on his journey from the farm to a lifelong career as a folklorist.--Mississippi Today Reveals Ferris's natural and direct eye, with each section growing in narrative power and scope. . . . Lyrical and sensitive, the photos reveal a dichotomy between tradition and change, rich and poor, black and white, tracking race relations in the South.--Publishers Weekly

[Ferris's] photos and commentary expose rural nature, African-American culture, country stores and everything in between. It speaks of the hospitality, the art and the unique lifestyle of Southerners.--Daily Mississippian [Ferris] distills his formative decades, the 1960s and '70s, into plain-spoken poetry about what life feels like in his more intimate, equitable and interconnected South. . . . In these images, Ferris' use of color shines. . . . His characters transcend the labels of black and white or have and have-not, granted a documentary pedestal from which they say their own pieces in their own voices.--Julian Rankin, The Clarion-Ledger A visual journal boasting 103 photographs of the region's idiosyncratic characters and landscapes.--Atlanta Journal-Constitution An insightful exploration of the American South. . . Illuminates Ferris's understanding of race, culture, and community in the South.--Valley Voices At first glance, The South in Color may appear to be a book about the difference between its subjects; for author Bill Ferris, it is about what makes them the same. Indeed, while turning through its pages, a strong sense of time, place and connection are impossible to ignore.--Chapel Hill Magazine Bill Ferris has taught a lot of people how to embrace Southern culture. . . . Now he's showing us what he loves in photographs.--Daily Beast Captures [a] vanishing place. . . . Striking. . . . Ferris is catching a moment of transition. . . . Much of Ferris' imagery seems timeless.--Ben Steelman, Wilmington Star-News For Ferris, each photo tells a story.--Vicksburg Post Provides an honest and open perspective on his journey from the farm to a lifelong career as a folklorist.--Mississippi Today Starting with [Ferris's] boyhood days on his family's farm near Vicksburg, Mississippi, the book includes vivid portraits of the region's people and buildings and reflects his ambivalent relationship with the 'beautiful and haunting worlds that always surround me.'--Pennsylvania Gazette The images are singular, never redundant, each building quietly and powerfully upon those before it.--Memphis Commercial Appeal William Ferris offers us a huge gift, by taking us into such a personal trip.--Blues Magazine With this book, Ferris hopes he can connect readers of today to the 'intimate worlds' of a bygone era in rural Mississippi.--The Pilot

The images are singular, never redundant, each building quietly and powerfully upon those before it.--<i>Memphis Commercial Appeal</i>

Author Information

William Ferris is Joel R. Williamson Eminent Professor of History at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a former chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities. With Ferris’s two previous books, Give My Poor Heart Ease and The Storied South, The South in Color completes an informal trilogy of Ferris’s documentation of the South’s tumultuous twentieth century.

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