2006 Portfolio Prize Runner Up: LaToya Ruby Frazier

Although LaToya Ruby Frazier has been photographing her family since 2002, this is the first time she has presented these images of her family in public. In fact, not yet ready to confront what her camera had documented, she waited nearly a year before even printing her initial shots. That reluctance is understandable, given how unsparing and intensely personal these photographs are—were they shot by an outsider, they would be almost unbearably intrusive. But their honesty is tempered (though not softened) by the artist’s profound connections to her subjects. They find a lineage in the diverse family histories documented by photographers ranging from Ralph Eugene Meatyard to Richard Billingham, Sally Mann, and Nan Goldin. 

Frazier has clearly made this work with full awareness of the power not only of the pictures but also of the process of her making them. As she says in her accompanying statement: “Family secrets, hidden history, and constant silence defined our coexistence. Interaction only occurred when I began to photograph. The process of relentlessly photographing my family allowed me to meditate on the complexity of our relationships and the roles we played. My position as daughter and photographer transcends the objective approach utilized in standard documentary practice . . . Through the first-person point of view, the audience will witness the complexity, anxiety, pain, despair, and dysfunction of a life interwoven with love, sensitivity, and the enduring family bond.”

LaToya Ruby Frazier, who is completing her MFA in art photography at Syracuse University, has been represented in numerous group exhibitions, including the Everson Museum of Art Biennial, Syracuse; Queer Eye, Harbor Gallery, University of Massachusetts, Boston; and Breaking the Ice, Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y. Her films have appeared in several festivals, and she has taught photography to students ranging from elementary school to university.