Increasingly, the work I'm doing is in service to an idea rather than just to see what something looks like photographed. I'm trying to explore how I feel about something through photography.
Sally MannRead
It's a touchy subject, but as a Southerner, you can't ignore our history any more than a Renaissance painter can ignore the Virgin Mary. And it's impossible to drive down a road or eat a vegetable or pass a church without being reminded of slavery.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes the inescapable connection between Southern identity and the history of slavery in the United States.
Sally Mann's quote highlights the profound historical influences on Southern culture, suggesting that just as a Renaissance artist must acknowledge significant themes like the Virgin Mary in their work, Southerners cannot detach themselves from the historical legacy of slavery. This intersection of history and daily life is inescapable, as it permeates the landscape, culture, and social interactions within the South.
Themes
Southern IdentitySlaveryHistoryCultural LegacyMemory
In practice
Example use cases
Discussing the impact of Southern history in a lecture on American culture.
More from Sally Mann
All quotes →Sometimes, when I get a good picture, it feels like I have taken another nervous step into increasingly rarified air. Each good-news picture, no matter how hard-earned, allows me only a crumbling foothold on this steepening climb—an ascent whose milestones are fear and doubt.
Sally MannRead
I can think of numberless males, from Bonnard to Callahan, who have photographed their lovers and spouses, but I am having trouble finding parallel examples among my sister photographers. The act of looking appraisingly at a man, making eye contact on the street, asking to photograph him, studying his body, has always been a brazen venture for a woman, though, for a man, these acts are commonplace, even expected.
Sally MannRead
The earth doesn’t care where death occurs. ...It’s the artist, by coming in and writing about it or painting it or taking a photograph of it, that makes the earth powerful and creates death’s memory. Because the land will not remember by itself, but the artist will.
Sally MannRead
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