Sally Mann

So on in our last class, we watched a video on Sally Mann.  We were instructed to write a one-page reaction to the video.  Here it is...

Sally Mann’s body of work is exceptional.  Personally, I thought the movie we watched on her was enthralling.  I don’t know why Roddy would think we would all fall asleep.  I liked the collection of her family pictures better than the death pictures but something about that project really struck me.  When the gallery cancelled her show and she was upset about it, eventually she came to realization that it would be alright if it didn’t get put on the walls.  That maybe it would never get on the walls and that was ok because the project was something that she needed to do.  I think that when she was talking about that project, that was what distinguished her as a great artist.  Not just a photographer but an artist.  She wasn’t worried about making money or having anyone see her work, but she thought her idea and her project were important and she was compelled to finish it even if no one would display it.  Because she was right, death is something that I think is hard for people to really look at and appreciate because we want to be so far from it.  It fills us with emotions that we don’t necessarily want to feel/ 

            But honestly I liked her earlier pictures better.  I loved the sharp, crisp, faces of her children that were full to the brim with emotion.  She got them to pose to well and their expressions, expressions that they had just from being themselves and being children, carried the photographs and really did make them powerful.  Some of the death pictures I was less impressed with because of the darkness in the prints or the blurriness, and what Sally called the impurities that she actually liked.  But I guess that is what make her different from me.  I like the perfectness of a photograph and she can appreciate the impurities.  I mean, I could appreciate her vision and her idea for her project and I thought it was thoughtful, provoking, and deep.  I’ll just end by saying that I loved the idea, and I can appreciate her view as an artist, but I wasn’t overly impressed with the photos.  But I was very impressed with her.