The photographer Marla Sweeney has explored the beach area near the American coast city of Salisbury. The result of her efforts is exhibited at Galleri Image in Århus.

By Birgitte Hjort Jaritz
Photo: Marla Sweeney

The exhibition Salisbury is shown until May 20th 2007
www.galleriimage.dk

Marla Sweeney takes us to the beach near the American coast city of Salisbury north of Boston, Massachusetts. Here, we meet an unpolished portrait of American everyday life, where people have put on their bathing clothes, relaxing. The pictures’ everyday realism, their unembellished representations of people and details in the beach area, are in harmony with the persons’ relaxed attitude. Thus, the portrait series Salisbury shows children and adults, all appearing naturally and unaffected by being observed through a camera. There is no dissimulation; we are allowed to look at the persons, even though their bodies are ageing, obese or pale.

The fact that these persons lack outward glamour in order to live up to today’s beauty ideals does not weaken their aura of dignity and inner calm. Just consider the old woman sweeping away any thoughts about decrepitude and degeneration with her humorous Bathing Cap. Marla Sweeney’s portraits disclose a deeper beauty in the persons, whom she intrudes herself quietly into. The fat boy sitting with his legs crossed is not just the result of too many cans of soda. He is “Buddha Boy”, his look being both gentle and lofty. Getting under the viewer’s skin, the portraits are psychologically descriptive, conveying a rich gamut of emotions and moods, covering—as described above—the humorous as well as the religious or the deep. In many cases, a sensitive nature in the persons, who have planted themselves in solitary and remote places, is exposed. Or, contrarily, persons who have sought company as we see it in the picture Brothers, where two slight lads find courage and safety in their soft drinks and in their brotherly solidarity.

Consisting of pictures taken between 2003 and 2006, Salisbury is Marla Sweeney’s newest series. The series of pictures is a street-level narrative about everyday life in the part of American society, which Marla Sweeney knows from her youth in Massachusetts. In 2003, she went back in order to relive the beach and the amusement park in Salisbury, where she used to come when she was younger. However, the area has changed. The carnival at the beach has been stripped of its festivity and entertainment; the big wheel and the dodgems are out of action.

Not only does Marla Sweeney know how to capture the beauty of the ordinary in the beach guests; with her pictures, she makes the beautiful details visible in the otherwise so dreary and derelict surroundings which are supposed to be demolished. Like the personal portraits, these pictures of the coloured objects in the universe of amusement get beneath the surface. The emptiness of the park contains a narrative which is not, however, covered by a nostalgic veil as if the details had appeared muted, in a black-and-white photograph. On the other hand, due to the colour photograph, ‘the folksy’ is maintained for effect. Colour photographs are particularly associated with everyday life, perhaps because they are so mercilessly revealing.

Seen through Danish eyes, the series Salisbury expresses a different America than the well-known glamour of the pictures we see in the media—the desirable, beautiful and happy life. The series’ documentary stamp opens up a critical look at modern society. In a way, the series of pictures can be perceived as both depressing and repulsive because it brings us face to face with the exposure of bodies, which do not live up to today’s beauty ideals. Correspondingly, the photographs depicting the amusement park in decay may seem depressing because they display emphatically that the amusement of the place is no longer there. The pictures may provoke the viewer because they expose what is low social status, and they can give rise to concern about cultural decadence. However, besides the critical cultural reflections that the viewer may have, the photographs can be a relieving experience because they show us the world as we basically know it looks like in actual fact.

The picture series per se is open-minded, which is documented by the intimacy existing between the portrayed persons and the photographer. The unprejudiced approach causes the different beach guests’ personalities to expand, and due to the intimacy, their beauty becomes visible. When explaining her photographic approach to the motifs, Marla Sweeney refers to the French photographer, Henri Cartier-Bresson (1908-2004). He said that the camera can be “a weapon, a psychoanalytical couch, or a warm kiss”. To her it is “a combination of all three—confrontation, psychology and intimacy” (Marla Sweeney: ”Henri Cartier-Bresson said that the camera can be ”a weapon, a psychological couch, or a warm kiss. To me photography is a combination of all three—confrontation, psychology and intimacy”.

A fortuitous meeting with persons, objects and places in the public sphere creates the framework for the photographs; consequently, the motifs are not staged. Marla Sweeney’s working method is very similar to the one characterizing the genre of street photography. Henri Cartier-Bresson developed street photography and was a master at capturing unique photographic moments as they take place in everyday life, without people knowing they are being photographed. To achieve intimacy in the photographs, he made himself invisible, so to speak. On this point, Marla Sweeney’s pictures differ from traditional street-photography in that the persons always consent to being photographed. However, she insists on photographing people where she meets them, and she makes herself invisible in that she allows the persons to pose, without her instructions.

Even though Marla Sweeney does not arrange the motifs, she still, as an artist, leaves a considerable stamp on the pictures. Their expressions, for example, depend on which background she chooses, by moving about the portrayed person. The angle of a photograph reflects the photographer, and the artistic aspect of Marla Sweeney’s pictures lies in the photographer’s self-expression.                 

This essay is also published in the exhibition catalogue Salisbury Galleri Image in Århus.
Translation: Martin Bielefeldt, Art Translation

Related links:
www.galleriimage.dk