Public Relations
November 18, 2008
By Steve Fox
The American flag is one of our most cherished icons, displayed by Americans of every stripe: politicos with lapel-pins, bikers on headscarves and jacket panels, powwow dancers with face paint and beadwork, lifers with tattoos, cops with shoulder patches. In this historic presidential election, we saw the flag once again used by the right as a wedge issue, to distinguish “good” from “bad” Americans. One of the most ungainly flags in the world, it’s the inexhaustible material of our national identity.
The photographer Kathleen Brennan became aware that she was working against the appropriation of our flag’s image when she was starting a Peace Sign portrait project earlier this year. She had just read that the Peace Sign was turning 50 in 2008, and she wanted to photograph people giving the “v” sign for peace or holding some facsimile of the international sign for peace. (British designer Jerald Holtom, a conscientious objector in WWII, combined the two semaphor signals for the letters N, for nuclear, and D, for disarmament, into a circular symbol that first appeared in public on a march from London to the site of British nuclear weapons manufacture in 1958.)
So Kathleen asked friends to pose, and one, while posing, told Kathleen that she had, sadly, just given her worn old American flag to the Salvation Army because she couldn’t bear to fly it after the insults of the Bush administration. So Brennan began to use a large flag as backdrop, or prop, in the series, and she named it The American Flag Portrait Series. “I just thought that it might be a step in the direction of reclaiming the flag for all of us, not just those who claim it’s theirs,” she says.
One of the photos features painter Mimi Chen Ting, wrapped in both the American and Chinese flags, arguing for broad coexistence and multiple origins, rather than the chauvinism of the “USA, USA!” chanters.
Brennan is known for her photographs of her partner Kat’s scarred body after breast cancer surgery. In this project, she seems to be taking on injuries felt by wide swaths of the population, and, in Lincoln’s metaphor, seeking to bind up the Nation’s wounds.
Photographs are hard to sell to the public, and few galleries attempt to market them as they do painting, drawing, sculpture, and jewelry. But an outlet available primarily to photographers alone is the stock image business, and Brennan is aiming her work at the top three stock suppliers. Her photos were already at Jupiter Images, #3 in the market, when it was recently bought by Getty, the #1. Brennan is also targeting Corbis, the #2 image house, because they feature work that’s edgier than the other two. In addition, Brennan just bought the web domain name, AmericanPortraitProject.com. The flag portrait series should be up on the site within the month, she says.
Brennan shoots the portraits in her yard in natural light, sometimes diffusing the direct sun with a sheet or scrim. She places props on a table nearby for people to choose from if they wish. She’s finished about 50 portraits and will soon do another weekend of photographing, open to all comers. She gives people a fine print of their portrait in exchange for a signed model release. She prints the photos in full color, but with a muted, sepia-toned look radiating a soft, gentle attitude toward the parade of Taoseños who have appeared before her lens claiming their identities as “American.”
Douglas Smith Photo Show. Another Brennan project will soon reveal to us the life’s work of Douglas Smith, M.D., co-owner of the Taos Inn with his wife, Carolyn Haddock. Doug and Carolyn have traveled the world to remote areas and photographed many animals. He has boxes and boxes of slides that he intended someday to print for a show. Kathleen Brennan offered to sort through the slides, clean and scan them, and curate the show. It will be called “Journey: Images from a Lifetime of Travel,” and will feature some of the extraordinary places and creatures that they have come upon. The photos will be hung throughout Doc Martin’s restaurant, the Inn lobby, and the Adobe Bar. The exhibit opens Friday, Dec. 19, with a public reception Friday, Jan. 16, 2009, 4-6 p.m. The show will close Sunday, Feb. 15, 2009.