January | February 2006 - Boston Photography Focus

14 | DOCUMENT
Michael Manning (Cambridge, MA), Lee on the corner, Frances
and Churro stay warm on the grate, 2003, From the series “La
Familia,” 2003, gelatin silver print, 14 x 21 inches, Courtesy
of and copyright Michael Manning
exhibited at the Boston Architectural Center,
Fidelity Corporation (Boston, MA), and the
Danforth Museum of Art (Framingham, MA),
for which he was juried into the biennial New
England Photographers twice and won
a purchase award in 2005. A former staff
photographer to CNC publications, he has
also contributed to the Associated Press,
New York Times, Rolling Stone, Boston Magazine,
and the Boston Globe, among others.
Manning’s other projects include an inside
look at a large Greek Orthodox Church in
Watertown, MA, the festival of Cosmas and
Damien in East Cambridge, MA, and an
ongoing series on his own family. His website
is michaelmanningphoto.com.
AMBER DAVIS TOURLENTES
(Somerville, MA)
For the past eight years, Davis has been
photographing her family: her gay father, his
lifelong partner, mother and stepfather as well
as other gay-parented families. This project,
“Families on Stage,” features selections of
images of Boston area gay-parented families
taken during Family Week in Provincetown,
MA over the course of 4 years (2002-2005).
Sponsored by the Family Pride Coalition—a
unique non-profit organization that supports
legislation, funding, and research regarding
LGBT families—the weeklong conference
draws thousands and garners national attention.
Taken on stage at the local town hall,
each portrait serves to put forth a muchneeded
candid glimpse of the gay family,
which recently shifted demographically to
the Boston suburbs. Davis plays with expectations
of documentary work with her frank
compositional choices and sheer repetition.
A unique blending of art and activism, Davis’
project takes on increased meaning given the
ruling on gay marriage in our state, but also
speaks to how we all picture ourselves as and
within family.
A native of Boston’s South End, Davis
received her MFA in Photography and Computer
Arts at the University of Massachusetts
at Amherst in 1998 and then taught at Princeton
University (Princeton, NJ). Currently,
she teaches photography and new media at
Massachusetts College of Art and Emerson
College (Boston, MA). She is involved with
many activist and support groups such as
HRC (Humanity Rights Campaign), Families
Like Mine, and COLAGE (Children of
Lesbians and Gays Everywhere). Davis’s work
with gay-parented families has been featured
in countless solo and group exhibitions and
gay, lesbian, and transgendered targeted publications.
In 2005, she received one of five
individual grants in photography from the
Massachusetts Cultural Council. Her website
is amberdavisphotographer.com.
CONCLUSIONS
Each of the photographers in DOCUMENT
has expressed to me, on various occasions and
in various ways, an assortment of sentiments
beginning with the same verb: “remember….”.
Remember the issues behind the
photos. Remember the subjects. Remember
Amber Davis Tourlentes (Somerville, MA), detail of Families
On Stage, one family from the Boston area out of the series
“Family Portraits,” Archival ink jet print, (original in color),
2002-2005, dimensions variable, Courtesy of the artist
that these people are sharing their lives. I
encourage you, as readers and viewers, to consider
this advice as well. What do the subjects
give (or not give) to the photographer and
by extension, to us What do we take from
this documentary encounter What could or
should we give back to them The photographs
on display in the gallery represent only
the tip of the iceberg for the photographers
and for the PRC. Inspired by the exhibition,
we have planned an extensive menu of educational
programs (see page 4), school tours, and
an online component with additional information,
interviews, and links. As an added
resource, in the gallery and online, the PRC
presents what hopes to be an ever-expanding
annotated timeline of past and current documentary
projects by Boston photographers
focusing on Boston. As this goes to press, even
more outreach efforts are in the works. Philosophically,
these educational offerings are as
much a part of the exhibition as anything else.
Seen through the eyes and lenses of these 9
artists and their distinctive interests, sensibilities,
and methods, I hope a larger picture of
Boston and some of the social issues before us
at this particular time will come into focus.
Beginning with the opening of the gallery
exhibition, we encourage you to visit the
online component to DOCUMENT at www.
bu.edu/prc/document. In addition, a special
display of publications related to the themes
in the exhibition will be available in the
PRC’s Aaron Siskind library.