Photo Op

Catherine Opie's Political Polaroids 

Portrait of Barack, 2008. Polaroid, 41/8 x 3 9/16 inches

Created by the artist for Modern Painters.
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CO: I’ve been incredibly fortunate—people follow what I do. There’s only a few areas in my life where I feel pissed off about being a woman artist—for example, in publication. In spite of the amount of work that I’ve made, there’s no solid history of monographs behind those bodies of work. If I were a male artist, that would be different. But I actually feel enormously fortunate—how many women at 47 years old have a midcareer retrospective at the Guggenheim?

AH: What’s interesting is that the show that’s up there now is the Louise Bourgeois survey. And you’re following that at a time when major museum shows for women are still rare.

CO: I was so excited to find out that the Bourgeois show would still be up while I was installing mine. It’s beyond cool. And maybe it sends a message to other museums.

AH: So much of your early work was from the point of view of an outsider. And now you’re becoming an insider. How does one reconcile that shift? How does that affect your sense of self? I think of myself as someone who, no matter what, is perpetually on the outside.

CO: I think that’s a good place to be, because the fault of a lot of artists is that they get comfortable with who they are in relationship to what they make. And I’m not that comfortable. There are certain motifs that I follow throughout my work, no doubt. Since the icehouses and surfers, I’m gonna remain fascinated, for some time, until I figure out this horizontal, segmented, panoramic landscape. But I hope that I always follow what I’m truly interested in. ’Cause I don’t really see photographs that look like mine anywhere else.

AH: For all of us, obviously, our work is very personal. But I look at yours and your exploration of gender and of S&M culture, as you’ve grown up and aged. And now, as a parent, those interests shift. I can’t decide if one can be a parent and still be into S&M. [Laughs]

CO: I’ve been thinking about that. Because my best friend has two kids, and it’s still a very big part of her life. After I had Oliver, we went out to her house where she has a chicken coop that’s [an S&M] playroom. And I was making some really cute woman ride around on a tricycle, while I was hitting her with a cat o’nine. And it just seemed so odd to have somebody ride around on a tricycle.

Then again, the young daughter of good friends of mine, Renée Petropolis and Roger White, came over, and we were going through the proofs for the Guggenheim catalogue. I had once photographed the girl: she’s part of the children’s portrait. We got to the self-portrait of the cutting on my chest, and I explained to her why it was important for me to make this piece. And she got it. Then she went home and told her parents that she had this incredible experience of me explaining the photograph to her. The next day, at a cocktail party, her father walked up to me and said, “That was the greatest gift you could have ever given my daughter.”

AH: That’s what’s so interesting about your photographs: the importance of honesty—to your work and to your life. I think that’s what people have to deal with when they look at the work. Some people would say it’s in-your-face, but I don’t think it is. It’s about clarity and putting something forward that is very direct and very available.

CO: I was thinking, actually, about the portrait of your daughter that I did in 2006. That sequence of images of her dancing for me. How is it to live with that piece?

AH: It’s so great. [Laughs]

CO: Because a lot of the portraits that I’ve done are almost too honest to live with, I’ve found. Recently, I did a commission of this fairly wealthy family down in Orange County. And when I showed the daughter the portrait, she couldn’t even speak. I just said: “Well, take it home with your family and sit with it.” I could tell that it was just too honest for her. But I can’t do anything else. I’ve tried—for magazines and editorial stuff. But my work always comes out being a bit too real. And I think that it’s this realness that interests me in photography—it’s why I’ve maintained the documentary status. Even though I may play with that definition, I want it to be about a real realness, and one that also reflects history, to an extent.