[Leica] Re: Ms. Mann

[Matthew Phillips <mlphilli@hsc.vcu.edu>]

>Thanks for a very informative post. So these images are 4x5 or 8x10? What 
>camera? I've only seen them in repro but they look beautiful. Arthur
>

>They are great photos. I don't have any question about her ability as a
>photographer, just her exploitation of her children....
>B. D. Colen

A number of her earlier family series were done with a Toyo 8x10 metal
field... the same one that she endorses in a Toyo advertisement. The
landscape photos are done with a similar-sized format 19th century camera,
a nominal 8x10, but sizes on cameras of that vintage are rather variable.
In a lecture she delivered at the Virginia Museum, she made great affect to
finding an antique lens with the 'right' amount of fungus growth. (Big eye
roll.) The prints she exhibited at the Reynolds Gallery were very large:
the smallest being about 3x4 feet.

Regarding her 'exploitation' of her own children, and the aforementioned
prima donna personality, I relate this annecdote: roughly 15 years ago,
while I was a grad student, I attended a SPE (Society of Photographic
Educators) Conference in North Carolina. The conference was for schools
from all over the southeast. She arrived late, driving her BMW up onto the
lawn and hops out in a batik-and-mudcloth earth-mother getup with a 3-4
year-old under one arm. At the evening reception she holds court while
publicly breast-feeding this child who's old enough to speak in paragraphs.
And when its her turn to deliver a 45 minute talk on her work and
influences, she proceeds to show 3 carousel trays of slides of the entire
history of photography, for 2 1/2 hours, full of badly made slides and
mis-pronounced names. Two other talks were canceled as a result. 

Now, it may not be fair for me to judge this woman on her behavior during
one weekend, but it did make a lasting impression. A telling comparison is
looking at her work next to Nicholas Nixon's. Similar familial subject
matter, similar working method, similar format camera. But Nick Nixon's
images of his kids (or the elderly, or AIDS patients) have a genuine
tenderness in glaring contrast to Ms. Mann's usual grandstanding. Yikes!
Turn a hose on those youngsters!

Regards,
M.Phillips