The great Larry Sultan passed away last week. He was 63. Both he and Philip Lorca di Corcia have delved deeply into the idea of photography as fiction, and have played within that field, in creating precisely lit fictions that present an alternate reality that seems real enough to not only pass for our own, but exceed it and become the memory, rather than just its imagination.
In The New York Times obituary, the author relates a story that wonderfully exemplifies, to me at least, the condition of Sultan’s photography: “Mr. Sultan’s father, Irving, speaking of a picture of himself in a suit sitting on the edge of a bed with a vacant stare on his face, related how his son had instructed him not to smile and had created a portrait that the elder Mr. Sultan felt was much more about the photographer than the photographed.
“ ‘Any time you show that picture,’ ” Mr. Sultan said his father told him, “‘you tell people that that’s not me sitting on the bed looking all dressed up and nowhere to go, depressed. That’s you sitting on the bed, and I am happy to help you with the project, but let’s get things straight here.’ ” His parents died not long after the work was completed.”
