Travellin' Penguin

Art Work: On the creative life by Sally Mann

2025

Sally Mann is an American photographer who calls herself an artist. She is a Guggenheim Fellow and three time recipient of the National Endowment of the Arts Fellowship.

She finds she gets too many questions when she says she is a photographer. She also does not want to be roped into taking photos of weddings or babies.  I could not agree with her more on this front. 

She says, “And why not? Being an artist is not such a big deal. When you get right down to it, art is a job a profession not unlike being an insurance adjuster or a sportscaster. And it’s not all that hard either. The writer Nell Zink once asserted that. You could take the winos off the sidewalk in front of a drug store and teach them to be poets in half an hour. And I had a friend who quipped that he could strap his iPhone on his cat and have a series of masterpieces by the end of the day. In a similar vein, Veronica Geng once wrote a mordant New Yorker piece in which several hostages play ‘Lifeboat’ to pass the time. Whom do you throw off:  the nun, the pregnant woman, the majorette, or the artist Helen Frankenthaler? ‘Throw off Frankenthaler,” one of them says. “What’s art anyway? Somebody making some little something.” 

So like the drowned woman, I an just somebody making some little something. Many little somethings. A lot of the time. And how many little somethings I have made over a long, long time perhaps qualifies me to write this book.” (from the Prologue)

Throughout the book she shares some of her photos, her journal entries, her little drawings and doodles. She makes lists. She does some bits of poetry. 

I am really drawn to this book and can’t wait to get into it further. How many of us do these exact little things? Photos on our phones or cameras. Journalling, sketching, making lists to get through a day.

I think I’m going to enjoy dipping into and out of this book and hopefully get some inspiration for my own photography, making lists, journalling little poems or illustrations. 

I think when the world is so crazy or we go through health or home problems we need to step back and immerse ourselves in something that is creative, calming and often just makes us laugh. My drawings always make me laugh. I’ve been told by children in the past that I am good at drawing. Just like a five year old!!

Question:  What do you do to escape the world of stress to calm yourself. Photograph? Draw? Paint? Journal? Read? Walk? I’d like to hear about it very much. 

Tasmania is in the middle of a wintery heatwave. The temperatures have been beautiful. Yesterday we hit 26 degrees (79 F) and it’s May! The last time it was this warm on this date was 100 years ago. But of course it is all about to change.

Travel:

I leave early tomorrow morning on a small group photographic excursion for a few days into the southwest of our state to the old forests. We will be photographing fungi and waterfalls.

The eastern half of the state hasn’t had much rain so can’t find fungi as usual. But the southwest has had rain and reportedly the fungi hunting is good. However it is predicted to rain in the southwest for the next three days. So we will be covered in wet weather gear.

I cover my camera in a shower cap to keep it from getting soaked although it is pretty much weather sealed I feel the need to keep as dry as possible. We will be crawling around the forest floor, inspecting old dead logs and getting our tripods straight. I am really looking forward to it.

Books:

I just finished listening a really interesting book. Non fiction. Memoir. The Uncaged Sky by Australian Kylie Moore-Gilbert. Narrated by the author. Wonderful narration.

I was really engrossed by her story. She describes the whole experience so well. One of the senior guards fell in love with her and he made her life hell. There was no sexual assault but the mind games were dreadful. She would be told she was going to be released and then when in the car, driven to another prison. She wouldn’t love him back, of course, so he finally got rid of her by shipping her off. However he would still turn up. He used his position of authority in awful ways.  I learned quite a bit about Iran and there were some women guards who were nice to her. She made a few good women friends. All in all it was a very informative, interesting book and I enjoyed it. I am glad she finally got home after a couple of years. It was also interesting to hear the Australian side of things. Scott Morrison, a far right religious Christian zealot was the prime minister and pretty useless in getting her home. I was close to biting my nails by the end lf this book.

Life:

There were some other things happening. Not a lot of exercise. Having a bit of a break. And one of the friends from my senior group passed away and that has been sad. There is a memorial I will attend later next week. We will wear bright colours for her.

The pets are all fine. Ollie and Peanny enjoy chasing the postman’s motorbike from the front of the yard to the back yard. Our road passes both the front of our house and the back side as we live on a winding road. The dogs figured out if they run as fast as they can they can bark at his bike in the front yard then get him again at the back gate as he drives past it going up the road. They do the same with the Wednesday rubbish truck. A highlight of their day. 

I hope everyone is having a good weekend.

************

Question of the day-

If you are a character in the last book you read what are you doing?

I just got released from an Iranian prison and am back in Sydney. Let me know what you are doing, 

I have a book journal that has four pages dedicated to each book I read. . There is room for name/author. Type of book- ebook, audible, soft cover, etc. A place for publishers info. You get it.

There is also room for a photo if you like. Writing and character ratings. Overall ratings. There is a page for thoughts. Then the third page has questions.  Best character and why?  Worst character and why? Is this book a page turner? How did it make you feel? What were the main themes? The writing style? And last but not least did it have a good ending? These are fun questions to answer. But the last page is a page I’ve not encountered before in any book journal I’ve looked at. What scenes do you remember from this book. 

Not everyone is a visual learner. Reading a book to me is like watching a movie. I see the locations, the people, the animals, the emotion as if I’m in the same room with them. I can even visualise shapes to a book.

I have a friend who cannot visualise much at all but hears the book in her head. She can hear the sounds, the voices, the language. She cannot visualise what she sees coming up in a book. I find it all very interesting as I am not auditory at all. I could never hear to count syllables in a word as a primary school child. I don;t hear accents unless really pronounced. Lectures were difficult if I didn’t take notes. 

I just finished three books that I put in my journal and I decided to think of two or three “movie” scenes from each book so I can write them down in my journal. I didn’t realise it would be so much fun.

So here goes. 

What scenes did I remember from Two Women Living Together by Kim Hana and Huang Sun Woo? This was the book of the two Korean women who bought a house together as they didn’t want to get married and end up living with a mother-in-law or having to spend a life time in domestic duties.

***Looking back I can see them moving into the house they bought together and organising the furnishings in it.

*** I can see the two cats they live with and how they treat them like family members.

In the book The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley

*** I see four images. This is the story of the four people who were brought back to current days from past centuries. I even vividly imagine their clothes.

*** I can see our narrator in the room when she first meets Captain Graham from the Franklin expedition 1830s and is asking him questions about the past as he tries to adjust to what she is telling him.

*** I can see the narrator and Graham in their now intimate relationship acting as though they are a modern couple and hanging out.

***I can see the past scenes of Graham telling his men aboard the Franklin ship that the food is contaminated and spoiled and the reactions of the men. 

And last but not least I have images in my head from the book Time of the Child by Niall Williams. The story of the found infant who the doctor and his daughter Dorothy save and Dorothy as an unmarried woman in the 50s wants to keep and raise as her daughter.

*** I see Dorothy hiding upstairs in the house trying to keep the baby quiet while the doctor sees patients in his surgery downstairs. I see the layout of the bedroom.

***I see the local Priest coming to her front door and Dorothy and Graham sending him directly into their parlour so he doesn’t know there is an abandoned baby in the house. I remember thinking how in the world do they think they’re going to get away with this as time goes by. Where can it be hidden?

*** I remember Dorothy sneaking out of the house one winter’s night thinking she must leave the village with the baby in order to keep it. The street is snowy, the lights are dimmed due to the falling snow and wind. Her scarf is wrapped around her head.

With the images now embedded in my mind I know I won’t forget them as I wrote them down and thought about them. I know you could ask me about these books in the future and these are the memories that will remain and I should be able to discuss the book around those images. For me it will contribute to my memory.

I also realise I can transfer images into my diary as I wrote about events that happen on a daily basis. I don’t need to write today I had coffee in town at such and such cafe but I can visualise the memory and write a description of what I see in my mind. The server had green in her hair and earrings I liked them as they were gum leaves. The croissant was toasted and the coffee was in a cup I’d not seen at that restaurant before.

I like descriptive writing and this seems to make my own writing in journals more alive. I know it isn’t a new concept but recording images is a new  concept for me. 

Do any of you do the same thing? What makes you remember what book you read and what happened in that book?  I’d love to know.