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Today I got the chance to attend to an exhibition about Sally Mann. The exhibition is running on the Elysée Museum for Photography in Lausanne – Switzerland.
She is very well known for her work on family (her own) and her home land, Virginia. Her work generated a lot of controversia because of the uncomfortable reactions the photos caused.
Here is one of the most known Photo called Virginia at 6 in 1991. Virginia is Sally’s younger Daughter.
What we can feel with Sally’s work is that we can feel a all thinking about the role of Art in the artist daily life and also the role as emotional trigger among the public.
By putting on stage her own family, she shares her passion, her personal life and even I would say part of her intimacy. And by revealing these, she probably makes people uncomfortable.
Each time Sally Mann made a new exhibition, the press, family associations or even politicians looked for censuring part of her work.
The question is, should we let artists free to create ? Is everything right on the name of art ? Contemporary artists need to bring you further into the path they open. Otherwise it is just another photograph, another sculpture, another painting… The interest of such exhibition is also a way to create a context that will also make the visitor to think about his own definition of family, of what shocks you or not, the boundaries of one’s acceptance. Personaly I found this exhibition food for thought. Some photos are fascinating, hypnotizing, weirds… but at the end what matters is that she got a reaction from me.
Technically, she is brilliant. She uses wet collodion 8×10 glass negatives and her old 8×10 camera. This technique has at least 100 years now. That is why we get this special high contrast black and white effect. Not really a compact camera right ?
If you want to now more about Sally Mann, click here in Wikipedia
If you are in Lausanne-CH, do not hesitate to visit this exhibition, it is a brilliant collection.
Musée de l’Elysée, for Photography and Art – 18, av. de l’Elysée Lausanne
http://www.elysee.ch
Here are some other pictures I liked.
So, what do you think ?
L.A.