Sally Mann (American, b.1951) is best known for her black-and-white photographs, featuring portraiture and landscapes in the southern United States. Mann was born in Lexington, Virginia, and attended Hollins College. She began working as a photographer for Washington and Lee University after graduation, and her photographs of the construction of the University’s library were included in her first solo exhibition, held at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. Mann received great acclaim and critique for her Immediate Family series, in which she photographed her own children, often nude, in ethereal, unsettling works, picturing the everyday activities and games of a child while alluding to darker and more serious themes of loss, sexuality, loneliness, and death.

Mann’s more recent works include photographs of landscapes in the Deep South, which incorporate 19th century methods of developing photographs, and use damaged cameras and lenses, giving her work a scratched, unfinished look that continually references the photographic process. Mann has been awarded a Guggenheim fellowship and three National Endowment for the Arts fellowships, and has published several books of her photography. She exhibits her work around the world, in cities such as New York, Berlin, Chicago, Rome, and Tokyo. She currently lives and works in her hometown of Lexington, Virginia.

Timeline

1951
Born in Lexington, VA
1971
Studied photography at Praestegaard Film School
1966–1972
Putney School, Bennington Col., Friends World Col.
1972
Aegean School of Fine Arts
1973
Apeiron
1973
Ansel Adams Yosemite Workshop
1974
BA degree, Summa Cum Laude, Hollins College, Roanoke, VA
1975
MFA degree in creative writing, Hollins College, Roanoke, VA
1987
John Simon Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship
Lives and works in Lexington, VA

Exhibitions

2012
Imaging History, FoMu FotoMuseum Provincie Antwerpen, Antwerp, Belgium
2010
The Family and The Land: Sally Mann, The Photographers’ Gallery, London, England (solo)
Sally Mann: The Flesh and the Spirit, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, VA(solo)
Sally Mann, Musée de l’Elysée, Lausanne, Switzerland (solo)
Sally Mann, Galerie Karsten Greve, Paris, France (solo)
2009
The Family and The Land, Fotomuseum Den Haag, The Hague, Netherlands (solo)
2008
Sally Mann - Faces, Galerie Karsten Greve, Cologne, Germany (solo)
Sally Mann, Gagosian Gallery, Beverly Hills, CA (solo)
2007
Battlefields/Deep South, Kunstsammlung im Stadtmuseum, Städtisches Museen, Jena, Germany (solo)
Sally Mann, Stenersen Museum, Oslo, Norway (solo)
Sally Mann/Juhana Blomstedt, Helsinki City Art Museum, Helsinki, Finland
Sally Mann, Galerie Karsten Greve, Paris, France (solo)
2005
Battlefields, Galerie Karsten Greve, Cologne, Germany (solo)
2004
Battlefields, Galerie Karsten Greve, Paris, France (solo)
What Remains, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, DC (solo)
2003
Last Measure, Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York, NY (solo)
30 Years at Second Street, Second Street Gallery, Charlottesville, VA
The New Sublime, Northlight Gallery at Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ
Ghosts: Curated by Alison Ferris, Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, ME
The Family, The Gallery at Windsor, Vero Beach, FL
Flesh Tones: Curated by Vince Aletti, Robert Mann Gallery, New York, NY
2002
Visions from America: Photographs from the Whitney Museum of American Art 1940-2001, New York, NY
The Antiquarian Avant-Garde, Sarah Morthland Gallery, New York, NY
Aquaria: The Fascinating World of Man and Water, Landesmuseum, Linz, Austria and Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz, Germany
True Colors: Meditations on the American Spirit, Meridian International Center, Washington, DC
Curious Terrain, Elizabeth Harris Gallery, New York, NY
Fictions in Wonderland, Beverly Reynolds Gallery, Roanoke, VA
Forever Young: Children in Photographs, Eaton Fine Art, West Palm Beach, FL
Sally Mann: Yukatan, Catherine Edelman Gallery, Chicago, IL(solo)
Deep South, Galerie Karsten Greve Cologne, Germany (solo)
2001
Deep South, Galerie Karten Greve: Paris, Milan (solo)
Immediate Family, Byron Mapp Gallery, Sydney, Australia (solo)
In Response to Place: The Nature Conservancy’s Last Great Places, The Corcoran Museum of Art, Washington, DC (traveling nationally)
The Crafted Image: 19th Century Techniques in Contemporary Photography, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA
Christopher James Alternative Processes, Art Institute of “Re-Thought/Re-Seen", University of Missouri-Kansas City, Kansas City, MO
2000
The Swamp: On the Edge of Eden, Samuel P. Harn Museum, University of Florida, Gainsville, FL
Watchful Eyes, Catherine Edelman Gallery, Chicago, IL
Visualizing the Blues, The Dixon Gallery & Gardens, Memphis, TN
Photography Now: An International Survey of Contemporary Photography, Contemporary Arts Center, New Orleans, LA
The Portrait in Contemporary Photography, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH
Children of the Twentieth Century, Galerie Jesuitenkirche der Stadt Aschaffenburg; Mittelrhein Museum Koblenz, Germany
Southern Exposure, Contemporary Art Center of Virginia, Virginia Beach, VA
The Virginia Landscape, Virginia Historical Society, Richmond, VA
Focus on Regional Photography, Marshall University, Huntington, WV
Immediate Family, Andre Simeons Gallery, Brussels, Belgium (solo)
Family and The Land, Reynolds Gallery, Richmond, VA(solo)
Deep South and Mother Land, Cheekwood Museum, Nashville, TN (solo)
1999
Deep South: Louisiana & Mississippi, Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York, NY (solo)
Mother Land, Jane Jackson Fine Art, Atlanta, GA(solo)
Still Time, Mount Holyoke College Art Museum, South Hadley, MA (solo)
1998
Still Time, PhotoEspaña ‘98, Madrid, Spain (solo)
Still Time, University of Texas, Austin, TX (solo)
Still Time, Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, ME(solo)

Public Collections

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
The Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC
The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA
The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY
The University of Michigan Museum of Art, Ann Arbor, MI
Sweet Briar College Art Gallery, Sweet Briar, VA
The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, DC
Knoxville Museum of Art, Knoxville, TN

Literature

2009
Sally Mann: Proud Flesh, at the Madison Ave Gallery of the Gagosian Gallery, New York, NY
2006
Sally Mann, at the Gagosian Gallery, New York, NY(catalogue)
2005
Deep South. Bullfinch Press, New York, 2005
2003
What Remains. Bullfinch Press, New York, 2003
1997
The Lewis Law Portfolio, at The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington DC.(catalogue)
1995
Still Time. Aperture, New York, 1995
1992
Immediate Family. Aperture, New York, 1992
1988
At Twelve: Portraits of Young Women. Aperture, New York, 1988
1987
Sweet Silent Thought, at the North Carolina Center for Creative Photography, Durham, NC(catalogue)
1983
Second Sight: The Photographs of Sally Mann. David Godine, Boston, 1983