What Remains (Hardcover)

by Sally Mann (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Mann's previous collections, Immediate Family and At Twelve, recorded the bodies of children with a frank, slightly detached sensuality at a time when public hysteria around issues of child sexuality was sharply on the rise. The fact that many of the images were of her own children left Mann particularly vulnerable to charges of exploitation. But though controversial, what deflected such accusations was the serene flawlessness of Mann's pictorialist photographic technique, which somehow contained her very real provocation without necessarily resolving it. An even deeper sense of subtle disturbance pervades the four suites of photographs that make up this latest collection, whose subjects are mortality and death. In the two most graphic and difficult sequences, the remains of a beloved family dog and the corpses at a forensic lab are given equal emotional weight, equally luxuriant and pitiless memorialization. The difficult and time-consuming glass-plate process Mann employs, which results in an often dark, stressed and uneven surface, mirrors both the decay of the subjects and the movement of time that has claimed them. In another set, the almost invisible traces left by the death of a fugitive on Mann's property are recorded in washed-out images that convey with numb bleariness violence's psychic consequences. But in the book's most successful sequence-depicting the Civil War battlefield of Antietam-there are no literal traces of the dead at all, only an overwhelming psychic weight, which is reflected in intensely dark surfaces pocked with fissures and holes that at times resemble fields of stars laid over the barely visible hills, trees and fields. And if the last sequence, a series of extreme close-up portraits of Mann's (now grown) children, is less powerful by comparison, it provides the elegiac and loving coda to a book whose richness of presentation and sober subject matter work off of each other in varied and unexpected ways.
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Review
" Excellent, if sobering, collection . . . . Shot on glass plates instead of negatives, these photo have an eerie beauty." -- Business Week

" Shocking and beautiful " -- American Photo

"Compelling and disconcerting." -- Houston Chronicle

"Rich, wrenching meditation on death and life. . ." -- Photograph magazine

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 132 pages
• Publisher: Bulfinch; 1 edition (September 23, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0821228439
• ISBN-13: 978-0821228432
• Product Dimensions: 12.7 x 11.5 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.5 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #200,444 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ethereal Meditations on Mortality, January 4, 2005

By	Grady Harp (Los Angeles, CA United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 10 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

WHAT REMAINS is an apt title to this extraordinary photographic portfolio by the sensitive, ever inquisitive, gentle spirit of Sally Mann. Though often criticized for her 'audacity' of material she elects to photograph, Mann is never less than creative and challenging.

This well designed book is divided into sections that explore life and especially death in its many guises - accidental, violent, natural - and the remains of the deed, matter with which we the living must deal. There is the death of a family greyhound shown with grief and simplicity, the violent death of a criminal killed on Mann's property and the gore of that event and aftermath, a series of views of dead bodies in a morgue, and dark landscape survey of Antietam (a battlefield fro the Civil War) that is haunting and all too reminiscent of ongoing battlefields we still create, and finally some views of her own children's faces.

The camera techniques include ambrotypes and modes of developing that are both difficult and rewarding. One is left with the impact of the fine line between life and death and that vacuum that exists when one becomes the other. Some may find this particular portfolio difficult to see, but perhaps those people will gain the most from Sally Mann's meditations on life and death. Grady Harp, January 2004

26 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Shocking, October 27, 2003

By	Peter G. Neofotis "Peter Neofotis" (New York, NY) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The first time I viewed this book, standing over it for nearly an hour, I was left socked, so shaken that I had to go to my room and turn off all the lights, and just lie in my bed and rest myself.

What Mann has created is not definable, and doubtless each viewing experience will be different for each individual. She does not seem to be creating an agenda book as much as an human experience. As I moved through I kept on thinking about, or rather questioning myself. What is it to look at a dead body? Is it a sign of disrespect for the dead? Or is it a sign of reverence? After all, it is the easy thing to turn away from the rotting flesh of our family, but that does not mean that it is the respectful thing, right?

One would think that Mann, already an artist at the top of her profession, might be tempted to rest on her laurels. However, this new work proves that she has no intention of doing so. She bravely continues to take risks, as well as dive further into her subject matter, and what remains is one of the world's greatest artists functioning at the peak of her creative powers.

13 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Hauntingly Beautiful, September 11, 2003

By A Customer

I was not very familiar with the work of Sally Mann but was so captivated by the cover image on this book that I had to buy it. I was thrilled to see that the interior images are even more compelling. This look into mortality evokes different feelings every time I pick it up. The quality of the images seem far superior to most photography books out there; it's as though the book is filled with actual photographic prints. I highly recommend this book, it would be a unique and meaningful gift.