Photobook club – stagione 1, episodio 2 MOM, by Charlie Engman, published by Patrick Frey. Texts by Rachel Cusk, Miranda July; design: Brian Paul Lamotte

Who Kathleen McCain Engman? How many answers can we find?

In this collective reading, getting through an analysis of Engman’s images we’ll try to deconstruct the camera’s obsessive gaze on the mother figure. We will delve into the multiplicity of languages and styles used, quotations, the role of portrait photography, and its relationships with literature and visual art.

The title of the book reveals the identity of its main character: Kathleen McCain Engman has been posing for her son Charlie since 2009. Yet MOM shows us a face we never really get to know: while we soon learn about her freckled complexion and intense gaze, her position in the images becomes less and less clear. Engman began photographing his mother because she was available, always ready to meet the requests of one of her children. But what began as a casual, organic process has evolved into an intense collaboration. The result is neither a family album nor a filial tribute, but a much deeper and more complex interaction that raises questions about the limits of familiarity, the rules and boundaries of roles and representation, vulnerability and control, and what it means to look and be seen.

MOM is part of the display of books in dialogue with Julia Mejnertsen’s exhibition HUN, on view at Spazio Labo’ through April 11.

Reserve your place at info@spaziolabo.it  or fill out the following online form: https://forms.gle/6zMiACwgMsHW6kaB6

Participation is free and you don’t need to be a member or partner of Spazio Labo’ to participate.

The reading group is a free cultural activity designed and organized by Spazio Labo’ in line with the special focus on photobooks that has always took shape in its library and since 2022 in the bookshop in collaboration with Leporello. 

The bookshop and library are open Monday through Friday 4 to 7 pm at Spazio Labo’, Strada Maggiore 29 – Bologna.