More About the Remarkable Mary Ellen

Mary Ellen Mark, "Rat" and Mike with a gun, Seattle, Washington, USA, 1983

TOP is usually off on Saturdays, but in case you have a bit of extra time today, I thought it would be valuable to list the best of the great links we collected yesterday.

First, Rat: the boy on the left in Mary Ellen Mark's famous picture "Rat and Mike" above (his real name is Rich) is now a 48-year-old tow-truck driver with a "beautiful wife, beautiful children and grandchildren." He cried when he learned of Mary Ellen's death.

You can read an update about his life and what he's doing now in an article by Chris Macias of The Sacramento Bee. This was suggested to us by Rick D; thanks, Rick.

In case you never have and you'd like to read the original 1983 LIFE magazine "Streets of the Lost" article first, you can find it in readable form on Mary Ellen's website. I'd recommend reading this before reading the update. It's a great classic of photojournalism and of the photo-essay form at its best.

Next, Kyle: Old friend-we've-never-met Kyle Cassidy, a fascinating photographer in his own right, wrote a very beautiful short piece about Mary Ellen on his Live Journal website, pointed out by Kathy Li. It's of special interest to practicing photographers, giving a window into Mary Ellen Mark's attitudes and determination and the way she taught. Not to be missed.

(Kyle says Mary Ellen used to introduce him by saying, "This is the weirdest photographer you'll ever meet. He's good, but he's weird. Aren't you?" Funny.)

Kyle's piece really points up the truth about what reader latent_image said in the Comments: "Following news of her death, I saw Mary Ellen Mark referred to in one article as a 'street photographer.' To me street photography is characterized by anonymity. Mark's work was always about connection and intimacy...just the opposite."

Finally, 'Mary Ellen presents': If you really have some time to spend today (the video is more than an hour long), Robert Hudyma found this great video of a slide lecture given by Mary Ellen, at Ryerson University's Ryecast. Many of us have heard her speak in person, but if you haven't, this will be the next best thing. The images are not always coordinated but it's valuable to be able to see better-quality versions of the pictures on the right. Studying the pictures in the slideshow emphasizes one of Kyle Cassidy's insights about the work: "You don’t need to know that someone’s a movie star or someone’s a prostitute or someone else just won a mustache contest, they’re all beautiful images first."

We'll be back on Monday with the Spring season's exciting Kate Kirkwood Print Offer announcement.

Mike
(Thanks to Rick D, Kathy Li, Robert Hudyma, and everyone else who commented yesterday)

Original contents copyright 2015 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Comments

[Lance Evingson]

I was grateful for your coverage of Jane Bown and this continues to bring forth my gratitude for your highlighting these pieces about Mary Ellen Mark. I will invest an hour in the video of her slide presentation immediately.
Thanks again.

[Michael Cytrynowicz]

Mike, I knew very little about Mary Ellen Mark, although I recognized immediately some of her photographs (e.g., the California family in the car). What you've done here (and in many other occasions) is of great educational value to me. Now I know the world lost an amazing person, and I think I can even understand latent_image's comment. She could communicate what was simple, powerful truths about people, because she loved them.

[Jim Metzger]

I had the extraordinary opportunity to meet Mary Ellen Mark in what I considered the most unlikely of places.

Somewhere in the early 1990's I had dogs that modeled for film and television. I got a call from their agent and was asked to bring Helga the Bulldog to a studio in NYC. I had no idea what these images were being used for.

In the studio greenroom there were many children with their hyper parents. I was told to wait and would be called when needed.

The door to the studio opened and I was called to come in with a young boy in a football uniform. He and Helga were put on a platform and were told to wait. The photographer was huddled in the dark of the studio with assistants changing magazines on the 2 1/4, art directors and general hangers on. It was chaotic.

judging by the crowd of kids waiting to be photographed, they were trying to get dozens of setups on film in a very short time. It turns out this was the first campaign for the "Got Milk?" series being done with unknown child models.

At sometime during the pop, pop, pop of studio flash I heard someone ask "Mary Ellen, do you need a fresh back"? It hit me then I was in the presence of greatness doing the most mundane of jobs. I had about 2 seconds as we were being rush out to make way for the next setup to ask Ms. Mark "Why are you doing this"?

Her reply which is a cold dose of reality for many of us today, "How do you think I can afford to go to Mexico for 6 months to do what I think is important"?

A very brief interaction and she changed my perceptions of life and work forever.

Thank you Mary Ellen.

[Steve Rosenblum]

Mary Ellen Mark gave one of the Penny Stamps lectures in Ann Arbor in 2013 and was introduced by her old friend, David Turnley. It is worth watching.

[Joseph Reid]

I was very lucky to have taken one of Mary Ellen Mark's workshops a few years ago. She showed us lots of her work -- it was the fist time I'd seen dye sub prints, they were of her Mumbai work and the color was breathtaking. No way would I have bought a Ctein dye sub print if I hadn't seen those pictures in person. But the most memorable part of the workshop, for me, was the portfolio review. There were about ten of us, I think, people of various ages, professions and skill levels. Most of us showed ten or twenty pictures neatly arranged and printed. One member of the group dropped about 100 prints of varying sizes, styles, quality and subject matter on the table and I thought -- how ridiculously rude, given the situation, ten people, limited time, and we paid for this. Mary Ellen did not miss a beat. It took her about one minute of sorting and shuffling to find a pattern in what that guy was up to. The way she made sense of what to me was chaos was incredible. She was kind and encouraging to me but the one person whose work struck her the most was Stacy Leigh. NSFW warning: http://www.stacytheartist.com/
I'm sure Mary Ellen was struck by the complicated social statement those pictures make, about Americans, the age we're in, as well as the photographer.

[Robert Gordon]

Sadly, the Ryecast video will not play on the IPad Mini.