Now it’s a lot more important to me to actually say something.” That was the impulse was to either take pictures to save something, or to try and see what something would look like when it was photographed. Mann stated in a recent interview, which I really found insightful, “I think the difference is that I used to be taking pictures to save things. I see everything in black and white and I also now start seeing things.”

“I mean, the color’s just an entirely different process, way of thinking. You’re not distracted by the color,” she said. “That’s not why I like it, but it’s harder, but it also makes you get right to the essence of what you’re taking the picture of. She said she likes black and white photography. Mann has photographed and worked on her family farm for almost 50 years, with a steadfast commitment to the past - in approach and process. Mann describes her new memoir as a “deeply personal explorations of the landscape of the American South, the nature of mortality (and the mortality of nature), intimate depictions of my husband and the indelible marks that slavery left on the world surrounding me.”

Seeing her work, tenacity, and intensity makes me want to return to the darkroom and film - maybe that will be the next project. I have most of Mann’s books containing her work, and I have been fortunate enough to see her work in person in galleries and museums in Manhattan. I was first introduced to Mann’s work during college. The full title of Ms Mann’s book reads: ‘Hold Still: A Memoir with Photographs’, which differentiates it from the Duchess of Cambridge’s book.Īlthough she is an aspiring photographer, the images in Kate’s book were also not taken by her but submitted by members of the public up and down the country.ĭespite the comparisons to Ms Mann’s book, the text has received a staggering response online - many Amazon reviewers give it five stars, and dub it an “absolutely beautiful book”.I am excited to read Sally Mann’s new memoir, Hold Still: A Memoir with Photographs. Her images are also accompanied by lyrical prose, while the photographs show a range of tragedies from “the return of the prodigal son” to “clandestine affairs”. Ms Mann's photo memoir recounts her own personal family history, and many of the images were discovered after she sorted “through boxes of family papers and yellowed photographs”.

Ms Mann’s text was a National Book Award Finalist, and voted one of the best books of the year by The New York Times, Washington Post, The San Francisco Chronicle, Vogue, NPR, Publishers Weekly and Bookpage back in 2015.

Hold Still by Sally Mann