Portland Escorts: Interview: Mary Ellen Mark on photography
by escortingportlandMark, 70, is coming to Portland courtesy of the Newspace Center for Photography, which is producing and presenting a workshop and lecture featuring Mark. The workshop is sold out, but limited seating remains for the Friday lecture at Mercy Corps.
Charismatic, slightly irascible and wise, Mark will talk about her past and current work, including a current project on proms at American high schools. (Mark’s husband, filmmaker Martin Bell, has made a documentary on the subject as well.)
During her more than 40 years taking pictures, the Pennsylvania native has created a remarkable body of documentary and photojournalistic work known for its acute sensitivity toward people — work that also reflects strong social and political values.
Influenced by Robert Frank and Helen Levitt, among others, Mark’s been particularly drawn to those living life on the far edges — circus people, prostitutes in remote pockets of the world and the women inside the security ward of the Salem-based mental institution, Oregon State Hospital, for example.