Sally Mann Photos Seized from Texas Museum Following Official Complaint
176Jan. 8, 2025
A group of works by renowned photographerSally Mannthat appear in a group show at theModern Art Museum of Fort Worthhave drawn the ire of local officials, who allege that they are harmful to children. The contested photos, on view in the exhibition “Diaries of Home,” depict children in the nude and are exemplary of the intimate, stylized portraits of her own children that gained Mann wide acclaim in the 1980s and ’90s, even while they sparked controversy. TheDallas Expressreports that a warrant was issued and the works “secured as potential evidence” by Fort Worth police after Tarrant County Judge Tim O’Hare filed a complaint demanding a criminal investigation.
Mann is one of thirteen artists whose work is on view in the documentary exhibition, which “features works by women and nonbinary artists, who explore the multilayered concepts of family, community, and home.” Though the museum on itswebsitewarns that the exhibition includes “mature themes that may be sensitive for some viewers,” some visitors took issue with the images, one of which shows an unclothed girl standing on a picnic table and another a frontal view of a boy’s naked body, complaining to theExpressthat they represented “pedophilia” and “child rape.”
“There are images on display at this museum that are grossly inappropriate at best. They should be taken down immediately and investigated bylawenforcement for any and all potential criminal violations. Children must be protected, and decency must prevail,” O’Hare told the news outlet on December 26.
“Our wonderful museums should be promoting excellence instead of radical perversion,” Tarrant County Republican Party Chairman Bo French told the outlet, with House District 91 State Representative-elect David Lowe asserting, “It is crucial that our legal framework leaves no room for predators to misuse the realm of art to display child nudity.”
“The controversy surrounding Sally Mann’s photographs is deeply troubling and is not an isolated incident,” Julie Trébault, executive director of Artists at Risk Coalition, a nonprofit that works to protect artistic freedom, toldArtnet News. “Rather, it reflects a broader, escalating trend of censorship targeting artists and institutions whose work challenges societal norms or explores sensitive topics. In recent years, organized efforts—often driven by political figures, advocacy groups, and community actors—have sought to discredit or remove artworks addressing themes like identity, gender, sexuality, race, and family.”
“These include legislative attacks on LGBTQ+ content, threats to public funding, and public campaigns that mischaracterize art as obscene or harmful,” Trébault continued. “This growing wave of censorship, which disproportionately targets women, LGBTQ+ creators, and artists from historically marginalized groups, often relies on the construction of a controversy as pretext for a wider purge of targeted artwork.”
Mann in a 2015 article in the New York Times Magazine addressed the controversy that has attended her practice. “All too often, nudity, even that of children, is mistaken for sexuality, and images are mistaken for actions,” she wrote. “The image of the child is especially subject to that kind of perceptual dislocation; children are not just the innocents that we expect them to be. . . . But in a culture so deeply invested in a cult of childhood innocence, we are understandably reluctant to acknowledge these discordant aspects or, as I found out, even fictionalized depictions of them.”