Familia Del Mar/Family of the Sea (Livingston, Guatemala), from the series “Tengo Casi 500 Años: Africa’s Legacy in Central America”

Tony Gleaton, Familia Del Mar/Family of the Sea (Livingston, Guatemala), from the series "Tengo Casi 500 Años: Africa's Legacy in Central America", 1988, printed 1994, gelatin silver print, 12 x 15 in. (30.5 x 38.1 cm), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase, 1994.11.1, © 1994 Tony Gleaton. Reproduction of this image requires the Artist's permission.

Artwork Details

Title: Familia Del Mar/Family of the Sea (Livingston, Guatemala), from the series “Tengo Casi 500 Años: Africa’s Legacy in Central America”
Artist: Tony Gleaton
Date: 1988, printed 1994
Location: Not on view
Dimensions: 12 x 15 in. (30.5 x 38.1 cm)
Copyright: © 1994 Tony Gleaton. Reproduction of this image requires the Artist's permission.
Credit Line: Museum purchase
Mediums Description: gelatin silver print
Classifications: Photography
Photoprint
Subjects: Figure group — family
Occupation — industry — fishing
Waterscape — sea
Waterscape — coast
Architecture — boat — rowboat
Object — other — net
Landscape — Guatemala — Livingston
Object Number: 1994.11.1
Linked Open Data: https://edan.si.edu/saam/id/object/1994.11.1

Artwork Description

In Familia del Mar, the gazes – of the father concentrating on straightening his nets, the mother who watches him work, and the baby facing the photographer – illuminate emotional relationships within the life of the family. Rather than passively recording interactions he happens to encounter, Gleaton positions his subjects and structures his images to reveal psychological connections, and he adjusts the tonalities of pictures shot in natural light when he prints them in the darkroom. “What you see in a photograph,” he says, “is rarely what really is. We give it meaning.”

African American Art: Harlem Renaissance, Civil Rights Era, and Beyond, 2012