What Remains

I’ve had What Remains: The Life and Work of Sally Mann in my Netflix queue since it came out a couple months ago, and it finally arrived this week. I watched it last night, and I think I might watch it again tonight and again tomorrow with S. when he’s over. It’s that good.

Mann was one of the first photographers whose work I fell in love with—particularly Immediate Family—and this film only deepens my admiration for her, as a photographer and a person. There’s so much in these 80 minutes to find inspiring, but here are the first couple minutes of the film, which are inspiration enough for now.



There is the temptation, I think, when you’re just starting out in something, to look for big ideas, big stories, big topics, because you think that if you find something important, your work will be important. But usually, the smaller and more personal you go, the more you pare things down to their essence, the more powerful they are.

Look for projects from me in the coming months that are more personal, less about the world outside my life and more about the world I inhabit. I’m planning to do a zine of one of them later in the summer. I’ll keep you posted.