Visiting the Body Farm

Never take a photographer to an exhibit of photography.

Oh, they're helpful when it comes to explaining things like collodion (I get it, a wet plate process), but they can also be a bit of a buzz kill with their over-analysis of it all.

This afternoon's trip to the VMFA to see "Sally Mann: The Flesh and the Spirit" was yet another couple date (he's the photographer, she's the charming girlfriend), which is fine now that I'm saying yes to more than just couples.

Given the size of the show and the range of years covered, I found it fascinating to see the work of the 20-something Mann morph into that of the almost-60 year old.

The show is a visual representation of what was written on one of the placards in the exhibit: the evanescence of youth yielding to the slow decline of age and inevitable death.

Sounds a bit harsh to me, but I suppose it summarily says it all.

I found the black and white nudes of her husband as evocative for their titles as for the images.

The Quality of the Affection from 2006 showed his back, a sensuous curve partly in shadow.

2009's Was Ever Love was a shot of his head in profile, in repose with his eyes closed. Both somehow spoke to a long-standing relationship.

In another gallery, the large-format pictures of her children's faces were so softly focused as to become completely abstract from a short distance.

All sense of a face was lost to unrecognizable forms; eyes and freckles were strokes and blobs.

Looking at the color prints from the then-controversial "Immediate Family" series taken in the early 90s, I tried to adopt the mindset of those who had found the photos objectionable.

Instead I saw only the personal detailing of a mother's appreciation for her children's beauty and the fleeting time that is childhood.

My favorite of the bunch was Bloody Nose with her son's bare torso, and mouth covered in bright red blood.

Despite all the blood, he looked as blase as any kid who has regular nosebleeds would.

As one who had more than my share of youthful nosebleeds, it was as evocative an image of childhood as any for me.

Probably the most visually arresting photographs were those taken at the University of Tennessee Forensic Anthropology Center (aka the body farm).

Since I haven't seen a whole lot of decomposing and decaying bodies, I was irresistibly and morbidly attracted to the images of bones, skulls and maggots.

I saw a decomposing raccoon on Monument Avenue last week and I've been describing it to anyone who will listen ever since.

Pictures of decaying corpses trump even that.

My couple date didn't have time to stay for the documentary What Remains: The Life and Work of Sally Mann, so this documentary dork will definitely be going back to watch it.

I've already heard from people who saw it this weekend that it's riveting for what it reveals of her intent and processes.

I'll let my photographer friend accompany me only if he agrees to keep his matter-of-fact opinions to himself.

Art is in the eye of the beholder, even the non-artistic beholder like me.