Proud Flesh by Sally Mann is a collection of photos that show the decomposition of the body overtime. Sally Mann’s husband, Larry Mann, sufferers a disease called muscular dystrophy. Basically, that means your muscles weaken over time. He mostly has been losing muscle in hir right leg and left arm. The things he once was able to do easily, now causes him much pain.
When Sally began taking these photos for Proud Flesh, she used her husband as her art. Sally photographed Larry using a cumbersome process that goes back to the 1850s. This is collodion wet plate, creating a large-format negative image on glass, not film. Sally says it was a a loving process of taking these photos. Her husband was very willing to help her complete this collection of him. Sally tended to take photos in which left the people in these photos looking vulnerable.
Sally said in an interview about these collections that it wasn’t so much abound his illness and his body slowing degenerating, but about a love story. When you look at the pictures you can’t help but notice his arm and leg, Larry was completely comfortable taking these pictures and showing these defects of himself off.
One picture specifically that Sally Mann says really spoke to her is called Tender Mercies. She says it actually brought tears to her eyes and she didn’t know if she ever wanted to publish it. It showed her husband as someone who was bigger then he actually was, bloated, sick, and weak. Someone he was not. However, he encouraged her to publish it because these were strong picture’s that really spoke about what he has to go through.
