| MOTTA FOTOGRAFIA 1995 Italy
Introduction Social documentary has always been the major part of my photography. I take pictures of people and most of the people I photograph are not famous. Working commercially for magazines, film companies and advertising agencies enables me to support myself and my personal work. Recently more than ever, assignments from the magazines are about taking portraits of the famous. Over the years I've learned how hard it is to make a great portrait of a well-known person. By great, I mean a photograph that can transcend the familiarity of someone's renowned face. A portrait of a person (famous or not famous) works if it tells me something very personal and insightful about the subject. This, of course, must be accompanied by beautiful light and perfect graphics. A really powerful portrait can uncover secrets about a person. The trend in today's celebrity photography is for the photographer to be totally conceptual. This is often easier for the famous subject because well known people are more cautious and less willing to expose their real personalities. It's far less revealing to hide behind someone else's theatrical fantasy. The result is a formula that can be graphic and slick but seldom gives any insight into the real personality of the celebrity. At the end of the week or month the magazine is thrown away and the portrait is forgotten. People who are not known are much different to photograph. They're not used to the camera. They trust more and give more. You can look into their souls and reveal their secrets. It is difficult but definitely possible to make powerful and honest images of the famous. Editing my photographs for this book was an interesting experience. I have collected some of my portraits of the celebrated and paired them with my portraits of ordinary people. I'm trying to perceive a relationship between photographs of the famous and the not famous. I'm also comparing pictures to see if images of the famed can be as candid and as lasting as images of the "unfamed" and if so, which ones and why so. I'm looking for answers and trying to learn. Photography continues to fascinate me. I'm sure that I'll take pictures for the rest of my life. Hopefully I'll continue to grow as a photographer and make stronger and stronger photographs of the famous as well as the not famous. Mary Ellen Mark |