mary ellan mark

[ader]

Hi,

does anyone know what sort of camera or film Mary Ellen Mark used ???I'm acutely aware that the camera does not make a great photo, but I was looking at her "american odyssey" and her work is incredible. Her images have a sort of "silvery sheen" or look about them. I heard Mary used a 4X5 but the photos look like there "off the cuff", spontaneous and totally unposed and renowned for being so I don't know if mary could of used a 4x5. on the other hand bruce davidson used a large format for his 100th east street ???? any input about her technique would be great!!!!

ta ade

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

Most of her work is with 4x5" or Hassy, as far as I know. Not sure which 4x5" she uses.

 

[Tom Duffy]

Mary Ellen Mark is one of my favorite photographers.
My understanding is that she started with a Leica rangefinder, which she used for years, suplemented that with Nikon FM2s (manual camera with high fill flash sync speed) for her India pictures. Moved to a Hasselblad and finally to a 4x5 Linholf Technica. In some photo mag article she was quoted as saying that for interior 4x5 she uses a big studio flash that allows her to shoot at f32. She shoots Tri-x in all formats. She still uses all three formats today.
I like her earlier work best, since her current exterior people shots, particularly the medium format ones seem heavily fill flashed.
Tom