Mary Ellen Mark: Man and Beast

Ram Prakash Singh with His Elephant, Shyama, Great Golden Circus, Ahmedabad, India, © 1990, Mary Ellen Mark

JANUARY 21 – DECEMBER 7, 2014
MARY ELLEN MARK—MAN AND BEAST
Photographs from Mexico and India

More than 90 images by renowned photographer Mary Ellen Mark include many that explore the fundamental, intimate working relationships between people and animals in two countries half a world apart. Mark has been taking uniquely sensitive and expressive images of people around the world for nearly 50 years. The title for this exhibition and the new Wittliff Collections’ publication, Man and Beast, was inspired by a dominant theme of Mark’s oeuvre: the relationships between people and animals, including, as Mark writes, “the anthropomorphic quality of animals and the animalistic quality of man.” Many of the people represented in this exhibition are performers and trainers with various itinerant circuses in Mexico and India. All gelatin silver darkroom prints are part of The Wittliff's permanent collection and featured in the Wittliff photography series book of the same name published by the University of Texas Press.