Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

This exhibition is no longer on view at the National Gallery.

For more than forty years, Sally Mann (American, born 1951) has made experimental, elegiac, and hauntingly beautiful photographs that explore the overarching themes of existence: memory, desire, death, the bonds of family, and nature’s magisterial indifference to human endeavor. What unites this broad body of work is that it is all bred of a place, the American South. A native of Lexington, Virginia, Mann has long written about what it means to live in the South and be identified as a southerner. Using her deep love of her native land and her knowledge of its fraught history, she asks provocative questions—about history, identity, race, and religion—that reverberate across geographic and national boundaries. Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings considers how Mann’s relationship with this land has shaped her work and how the legacy of the South—as both homeland and graveyard, refuge and battleground—continues to permeate American identity.

Organized into five sections—Family, The Land, Last Measure, Abide with Me, and What Remains—and including many works not previously published or publicly shown, the exhibition is the first major survey of the artist’s work to travel internationally. Featuring some 110 photographs, the exhibition is curated by Sarah Greenough, senior curator and head of the department of photographs, National Gallery of Art, and Sarah Kennel, the Byrne Family Curator of Photography, Peabody Essex Museum.

previous slides

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, On the Maury, 1992, gelatin silver print, Private collection. Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, Easter Dress, 1986, gelatin silver print, Patricia and David Schulte. Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, The Ditch, 1987, gelatin silver print, The Art Institute of Chicago, Gift of Sally Mann and Edwynn Houk Gallery. The Art Institute of Chicago / Art Resource, NY, Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, Bloody Nose, 1991, silver dye bleach print, Private collection. Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, Deep South, Untitled (Fontainebleau), 1998, gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Promised Gift of Stephen G. Stein Employee Benefit Trust. Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, Deep South, Untitled (Bridge on Tallahatchie), 1998, gelatin silver print, Markel Corporate Art Collection. Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, Deep South, Untitled (Scarred Tree), 1998, gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Alfred H. Moses and Fern M. Schad Fund. Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, Battlefields, Fredericksburg (Cedar Trees), 2001, gelatin silver print, Waterman / Kislinger Family. Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, Battlefields, Antietam (Starry Night), 2001, gelatin silver print, Alan Kirshner and Deborah Mihaloff Art Collection. Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, Battlefields, Cold Harbor (Battle), 2003, gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of the Collectors Committee and the Sarah and William L Walton Fund. Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, The Two Virginias #4, 1991, gelatin silver print, Collection of The Estée Lauder Companies Inc. Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, Beulah Baptist, 2008–2016, gelatin silver print, Collection of the artist. Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, Blackwater 3, 2008–2012, tintype, Collection of the artist. Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, Virginia #6, 2004, gelatin silver print, Courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York. Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, Ponder Heart, 2009, gelatin silver print, National Gallery of Art, Washington, Alfred H. Moses and Fern M. Schad Fund. Image © Sally Mann

Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings

Sally Mann, Was Ever Love, 2009, gelatin silver print, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Museum purchase funded by the S. I. Morris Photography Endowment (2010.163). Image © Sally Mann

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Organization: Organized by the National Gallery of Art, Washington, and the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts.

Sponsors: The exhibition is supported by a generous grant from the Trellis Fund.

Additional support is provided by Sally Engelhard Pingree and The Charles Engelhard Foundation.

Passes: Admission is always free and passes are not required

Attendance: 75,425

Catalog: Sally Mann: A Thousand Crossings. By Sarah Greenough and Sarah Kennel. Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 2018.

Other venues: Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, June 30–September 23, 2018
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, November 16, 2018–February 10, 2019
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, March 3–May 27, 2019
Jeu de Paume, Paris, June 17–September 22, 2019
High Museum of Art, Atlanta, October 19–December 16, 2019