4x5 transparency scanned on Hasselblad Flextight X1 by Ed Pollard-2010.

Jessie and the Deer

Artist Sally Mann (American, b. 1951)

CultureAmerican

Date1985

MediumGelatin silver print

DimensionsOverall, Image: 19 3/4 x 23 5/8 in. (50.2 x 60 cm)
Overall: 20 × 24 in. (50.8 × 61 cm)
Overall, Mat: 31 15/16 × 28 15/16 in. (81.1 × 73.5 cm)

Credit LineMuseum purchase

Object number87.329

Not on view

DescriptionThis is a gelatin silver print photograph.

Label TextSally Mann American (b. 1951) Jessie and the Deer from the Family Pictures series, 1985 Gelatin-silver print Museum purchase 87.329 Sally Mann's father gave her a camera when she was seventeen years old and told her that the only subjects worth photographing were love, death, and whimsy. Jessie and the Deer amplifies all three themes. Juxtaposing the body of a lifeless deer with her playful, tutu-clad daughter, Mann makes a powerful statement about the dualities always present in life. Viewers are left to ponder how innocence and violence, reality and imagination, even youth and death coexist. Mann began photographing her three children-Emmett, Jessie, and Virginia-in the mid-1980s. While many of these images appear to be typical family photos, Mann saw the project as an intensely collaborative work with her children. She explains: We are spinning a story of what it is to grow up. It is a complicated story and sometimes we try to take on the grand themes: anger, love, death, sensuality, and beauty. But we tell it all without fear and without shame. Exhibition History"The Portrait in America," The Alice R. and Sol B. Frank Photography Galleries, The Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, VA, Jan. 26 - April 8, 1990. "Women of the Chrysler: a 400-Year Celebration of the Arts," Large Changing Gallery, Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Va., March 24 - July 18, 2010. Published ReferencesBrooks Johnson. _The Portrait in America_. The Chrysler Museum, Norfolk, VA. 1990: 8, 63. Jeff Harrison, _Collecting with Vision: Treasures From the Chrysler Museum of Art_ (London: D. Giles Ltd., 2007), 121, fig. 148. ISBN: 978-0-940744-72-1