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 emILY’s messY FLOOr , 2006 C-PRINT 16x20 IN. / 40x50 CM. 
 COrsaGe CrIsIs, 2006 C-PRINT 16x20 IN. / 40x50 CM. 
 emILYaBBYWaLL, 2006 C-PRINT 8x10 IN. / 20x25 CM.
 emILY LOUNGING, 2006 C-PRINT 16x20 IN. / 40x50 CM.
 emILY sPreaDING GOWN, 2006 C-PRINT 16x20 IN. / 40x50 CM.

in order to fit in. Perhaps this is where the sadness begins and where Brown
points her camera lens, refusing to submit to the disappearing act played
by may of us on the road towards womanhood.
Early on, in 1996, Brown’s younger sister Emily is pictured with her body
pressed tightly between two clothes drawers, hiding, yet her eyes stare
back at the camera, refusing to relinquish power. Emily, also pictured in
1996, wears a sweatshirt with the logo, “king and I”, she is pictured as the
princess of strength, hips thrusting forward, eyes and mouth in states of
confidence. Abby, during that same year is also pictured with eyes that stare
back to the viewer, meeting our own gaze, quietly refusing objectification.
In another image, Abby is pictured with her toys, a plastic oven and iron
set. Her portrait, in this environment, feels meditative. Her eyes portray a
vacancy. Abby is lost in her own world, she is not entranced by the toys
that mentor domesticity.
Two years pass and something happens, pre-adolescence takes hold. The
two sisters are pictured in sullen states of contemplation, in the backyard,
although still on the swing set. In another image, Emily sits on the steps of the
front porch while water passes threw her hands, staining the steps just below
her reach. Still pictured as young girls, Emily and Abby are photographed in
states of strength and meditation. These are the black and white years.
In 2001, color sets in, and the two sisters are pictured differently. we still
see them intimately, but this time not in states of contemplation but rather
other transitional states like shaving legs in the shower or caked facials
before the girls’ Bat Mitzvah party. Ellie photographs Abby, in 2002 through
2004, as a girl pre occupied with her appearance and the material world.
She is photographed while shopping, manicuring her nails, and brushing her
hair. She is no longer pictured as a girl who refuses to be objectified, who
reveals in her internal world. Rather we see a young adult becoming a good
consumer, buying into a culture that insists she keeps up her appearance,
a culture that demands that she loose her sense of self, in order to fit the
mold. Abby looks beautiful, scared and angry.
In 2002 we view Emily as a healthy teenager, the usual angst written all
over her face. But something startling happens in a few short years. In 2005
Emily is pictured sorting food coupons and cleaning the fridge with a friend.
Emily is photographed from an ariel point of view; her collar bone jutting
out from her chest, skeletal arms reaching for food that will never be eaten.
Food related activities that will never nourish the body or the soul. Emily
has developed an eating disorder.
Ellie Brown, sister and photographer, begins to feels like a failure as a sibling
and artist. All the years of photographing her sisters to “open dialogue about
their issues,” seem to collapse in Brown’s arms. Do the images she creates
have the power to transform? will they help other young girls to understand
themselves and the place they hold in the world? Or, do the photographs
occupy a liminal space, a place where normal limits to thought, self-
understanding, and behavior relax, opening the way to something new?
This photographer thinks they do.
written by Robin Lasser /Professor of Photography at San Jose State University.
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