Family Matters in Linda and Mary McCartney’s Photographs at Gagosian
Linda McCartney may be best known as the late wife of Paul, but she was an artist in her own right, a celebrated photographer who shot iconic images of musicians like B. B. King and who became, in 1968, the first woman to land a cover of Rolling Stone. She was also the mother of four children: among them, the designer Stella McCartney and the photographer Mary McCartney, known for her candid-feeling portraits of eminent subjects like Queen Elizabeth II and total strangers (the latter she posts on her Instagram with the caption “#someone”).
Mary and Linda, who passed away from breast cancer in 1998, have individually shown their work many times: at London’s Victoria and Albert Museum (Linda); New York’s International Center of Photography (Linda); London’s Royal Opera House (Mary); and London’s National Portrait Gallery (both, separately). But never have their photographs appeared side by side.
Until now: On Friday, “Linda McCartney and Mary McCartney: Mother Daughter” opens at New York’s Gagosian Gallery. The idea for the show, Mary tells me from London by Skype, originated with the gallery, but it was a concept she’d been contemplating for some time. After Gagosian approached her early this year, the photographer says, “It happened very quickly. But I knew my mother’s archive quite well. I used to look through it and help her edit for different photography projects.”
The exhibition takes over two rooms at Gagosian’s Madison Avenue location. Rather than give each artist her own space, McCartney has hung the work in clusters united by subject matter or composition, allowing viewers to “see the conversations between them.” In some cases, Mary’s images seem deliberately to quote her mother’s: Linda’s shot of her own shadow in profile, taken in Arizona in 1991, is echoed in her daughter’s 2005 self-portrait, also in shadow but shot straight on. In other examples—say, Linda’s 1972 Paul With Rose contrasted with Mary’s 2001 The Carrot—the subject is the same, but each photographer brings her own sensibility.
By: Julia Felsenthal
Source: Vogue
