Deep South

by Sally Mann

A stunning collection of tritone photographs reinvents the art of landscape photography that evokes the vintage images of the American South in works that utilize methods favored by nineteenth-century masters of the photographic art to capture visions of Louisiana, Mississippi, Georgia, and Virginia. 20,000 first printing.

Genres: Photography, Art, Nonfiction, Art and Photography, Southern, Visual Art, Americana

120 pages, Hardcover

First published September 28, 2005

About the author

Sally Mann (b. Lexington, VA, 1951) is one of America's most renowned photographers. She has received numerous awards, including NEA, NEH, and Guggenheim Foundation grants, and her work is held by major institutions internationally. Her many books include At Twelve (1988), Immediate Family (1992), Still Time (1994), What Remains (2003), Deep South (2005), Proud Flesh (2009), The Flesh and the Spirit (2010) and Remembered Light (2016).

In 2001 Mann was named “America’s Best Photographer” by Time magazine. A 1994 documentary about her work, Blood Ties, was nominated for an Academy Award and the 2006 feature film What Remains was nominated for an Emmy Award in 2008. Her bestselling memoir, Hold Still (Little, Brown, 2015), received universal critical acclaim, and was named a finalist for the National Book Award. In 2016 Hold Still won the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction. Premiering in March 2018, Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings, opened at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC. This comprehensive exploration of Mann’s relationship with the South traveled internationally until 2020. In 2021 Mann received the Prix Pictet, the global award in photography and sustainability for her series Blackwater (2008-2012). In 2022 she was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Mann is represented by Gagosian Gallery, New York. She lives in Virginia.

Reviews

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Haunting photographs from one of the greatest living photographers who became known for her family photographs primarily, and for photographs of corpses. These are dark, misty, as if you are looking at something keeping secrets. Three short essays by her are included, and these are beautifully written, lyrical, leading me to want to read her autobiography.

[Erik Dryden · Rating 5 out of 5]

Artistic depictions of the American South are too frequently oozing with nostalgic sap. As an expat living in a foreign country called Utah, I suppose I should miss My Old Alabama Home, and I do, but not with an abundance of sentiment. Many bad things happened to me in the South, and while the people truly are friendlier there, and the culture of the Intermountain West does not approach it, I see the imperfections of the South, subtle and not so.

And here, in this collection of landscape photographs, I see my South. Through her use of the collodion process, one of the earliest forms of photography, Sally Mann has shown the true beauty of the South. The photos are blurry and streaky. There is imbalance and asymmetry. Our attention is strangely drawn to out-of-focus areas, to darkness, to particles in the light. As the edges are interrupted by blackness, I could almost gasp. I want to feel the textures of this fading, yet somehow unchanging, South. I want to go back there.

[Haines Eason · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mann achieves the purpose of this statement: “The hands of time are stilled by the resonance of history at the sites I photographed.” She set out to find the past present, and _does_. Note the temporal shift of that sentence and the “are” of her quote—this collection is then and now and thus always, and a classic.

[Teresa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very haunting photographs of southern landscapes in America. Her reverence for the land comes across in both photos and words, and she reflects on southern culture and race...one of the most impactful photos is the site where Emmet Till's body was recovered in Mississippi.

[Debbie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Definitely more of a "picture book" but her work is really cool. Also there is just something about the South (even with the shameful history).

[Deb cambria · Rating 5 out of 5]

LOVE IT

[Ralph N · Rating 5 out of 5]

Personally like her family portraiture better but this is solid too

[Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

A few well-chosen words; haunting photographs.

[Orest Mercator · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love the soft nebulas of sunlight in these ghost-filled landscapes

[Toni · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautifully presented photobook. Images combined with musings on place. Amazing words: 'vespertine gloaming' ...'a moist refulgence' ...'time become ecstatic'...

[kimberly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lush, in her imagery and writing.

[M. Sarki · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sally Mann has done some remarkable work in her lifetime. Her portraits are amazing, especially of her family members. I am not so enamored with her book of corpses and death though I am quite well aware there are many who are. I am also not so enamored with this book either. The photographs are beautiful, but I have seen many of these already taken of the South, including several of my own with a cheap Holga toy camera. A landscape that is so lush with Spanish moss and weeping willows, weathered stumps and ancient stone walls, that to mess up a photograph here would be almost sinful. It is pretty much a quality confidence builder taking landscape photographs in the South. Almost everything you turn your camera on is art down there. An amazing place where I like the "gloaming" too.

Mann controls her words quite well on the page. The three short essays offer up a trifle more than the photographs can muster, which is a good thing I think. Writing should, and can, be made worthwhile.

[Vicki · Rating 5 out of 5]

You cannot live in the South without knowing how haunted and traumatized it is. These pictures perfectly capture that haunted landscape. And Mann writes as beautifully as she takes photographs - I'm also reading her autobiography, and it is some of the most lyrical prose I've read in a long time. Just stunning. (I do wish that there was an index that told you where each picture was taken. There is only the general idea of it and you have to read her memoir to get more detail. Weird editorial choice!)

[Kristin · Rating 4 out of 5]

The writing was beautiful, and transcendant. I liked it almost more than the photographs, many of which I found capitvating. Being from the North, there is much about the South I will never truly understand, but a number of pivotal life moments happened for me in VA and SC - so seeing the trees and the battlefields the way I remember them - out of time, almost ancient, almost alien - it was like this book was made for me.

[N · Rating 5 out of 5]

At times, I’ve attempted to articulate what it is in Sally Mann’s photographs that sets them aside from all others. I almost wish to live in them (the landscapes, especially), and when I look at them it’s as if I’m recollecting a splinter of memory that had been unknowingly misplaced in the multitude of enduring months.

[Amy · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think I like Sally Mann's photography more when she's photographing people. This photo series is more about capturing a feeling of home than about being aesthetically or technically pretty. I felt like this body of photographs works together to evoke that feeling, but the photos on an individual level were kind of disappointing.

[Liz · Rating 5 out of 5]

stunning imagery.

[Hayley · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful book of photography that captures home

[Jason · Rating 5 out of 5]

She is the greatest living photogapher. I cannot overestimate how her work, especially the landscapes, has affected my own photography.

[Sharon]

Loved this!

[Aleta · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful

[John of Canada · Rating 4 out of 5]

The photographs were exceptional,but what really wowed me was the poetic quality of her writing.It's time to start collecting all of her books.

[Andrew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent pinhole photos.

[Andrea Cardinal]

her writing might be more inspiring than the photographs themselves.

[Edna · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love her work. this is a poignant book of photography....