Sally Mann opens the documentary film with saying that she believes as photographers, we will capture best what’s closest to us and what we love, giving instant reason to why she photographs her family. I agreed entirely, and maybe because my family is not what is closest to me, they never strike me as good subjects. Right now, I am more focused on coming to some sort of understanding and acceptance of materiality with regards to the quality of being physical and also to consumerism.
My immediate family serves great inspiration of all sorts and is worth documenting for at least the experience of documenting them. There is no telling how much success I would have in doing so without trying, but as it stands, I do not see them being the drive as the subjects of my photographs in any way similar to Sally Mann. I cannot see myself photographing any nude member of my family mostly because of the awkward family tensions that unfortunately exists between us. The emotions of Sally Mann’s family captured on film made me feel like modeling for her is not really what they wanted to do, namely the daughters. For all I know they just don’t like being filmed by strangers but it’s hard to tell. No documentary documents it all and I wonder how much choice her children have, how willing they are to model or if they are guilt tripped into it. The looks exchanged on camera at the dinner table when she brought out a picture of the kids topless and a few conversations throughout the film made me question they’re relations. I feel like my family would only cooperate with me to some degree if I guilt tripped them into it, in which case, as things have a tendency to repeat themselves, I would then catch negative vibes from them and unable to not let these negativities affect my photograph. I feel I would be better off searching for models outside my immediate family mostly because of family tensions. Over the years the original four in my family have spread out to three different states, not being united for years. I am scared of the heartache it may cause, but again I will never truly know how it would go until I try it.
Recently I came to notice I tended to feel rushed in my shoots with models in general. If that feel was indeed there or not, I am working on putting it out of my head and focusing on my work especially because I don’t always have the time for many reshoots. Because I have seen a rushed series looks like in comparison to one I pushed off that rushed feeling, I know what I need to do to improve my photographs. Slowing down is something I would be forced to do if I used a large format camera like Sally Mann. In every photo she takes she has to take time to set up, and allows that time to fully consider her composition There is no click and go with a beast camera like that. I nearly exclusively shoot digitally, because its portability, it gives me the time for not only my photography during the school year, but also time for the remaining essentials of my life, for work, for rest, for a little fun. And in an still increasingly digital world, I feel its where I need to be. However, I also sometimes to feel like my life needs traditional photography to help me slow it down to take a better look. Nonetheless I do admire Mann being able to become famous with her black and white prints in such times.
The documentary provided a sense of how she got into the photographs as seen in her work; how the first three years of her life she didn’t want to wear clothes somehow makes sense of her photography of nude children; how she grew up around death in art and watched her father die makes sense of her death photographs.
She made a comment in the film about how each amazing print we, as artists, create makes the next one have to be even better, which I also felt held true on a personal standard through my own experiences. Now that I finally feel like I have completed successful projects, I can look back at my previous ones and see how I have matured in my photography in my concepts, compositions, and techniques. The exciting part is going to be making something better than these projects I have just put on a pedestal.
She differentiated her husband as an artist and herself as a photographer, found for beauty in the decaying human body, and took photographs of her nude young children. At first it seemed to bother me how uncanny she came across as In the documentary but one thing that she helps prove is it pays to do something as off the wall as she does. It may not bring the desired fame, but it is fame no less. When word gets out about anything that is controversial and light will be shed upon it like on Sally Mann’s. Sally Mann is also a reminder that if you simply do what you love to do, you will get your deserved recognition. With persistence and dedication to what she wanted, after getting a show cancelled days before it opened, she was able to get other shows and galleries. Rejection is going to happen no matter how hard we try in the market. Though it is difficult to continue to make time for something that costs but does not earn, if we do it to fill our souls with passion and love then when we take that great photograph, one way or another it will be known by the public. She is a reminder that I have to dig deep into the depths of my creative soul and pull out something that hasn’t been seen and will leave people in awe.
