Mann, however, defended her children’s agency, even as she recognized the children might view the images differently after becoming adults (Jessie Mann grew up to become an artist and defended her mother’s work in a 2005 article in Smithsonian Magazine).
Mann acknowledged to Woodward the risk that she was taking, including her fear that her children could be taken from her. In fact, before publishing the photos, she consulted a federal prosecutor, who told her that several of the photographs could put her at risk of being arrested. Mann said she had decided to wait until the children were older before publishing the images, but when her children found out, they were upset she had not consulted them about that decision.
The photographs were published following family discussions the Manns had. Emmett and Jesse also spoke with a psychologist to make sure they understood what they were agreeing to, and the children had the power to veto any photographs of themselves that they did not want published. Both Sally and her husband, Larry, expressed their belief that the photographs would not harm their children and said their children were proud of the work.
In a lengthy essay of her own for The New York Times, published in 2015, Mann said that in his 1992 article, Woodward “pressed his foot hard on the controversy throttle, framing the discussion of my work with a series of provocative rhetorical questions.” During that interview with Woodward, Mann said, “I left myself wide open to journalism’s greatest hazard: quotations lacking context or the sense of irony or self-deprecating humor with which they were delivered.”
Regarding the public’s response to “Immediate Family,” Mann said she was “blindsided by the controversy” and described the letters people sent her. In 1993, after receiving criticism from people who said Mann was exposing her children to pedophiles, she and Larry consulted Kenneth Lanning, a former member of the behavioral science unit at the F.B.I.
Lanning looked at Mann’s photographs and told her that there were people who would be aroused by such pictures. “But they get aroused by shoes, too,” he said, according to Mann. “I don’t think there is anything you can take a picture of that doesn’t arouse somebody.”
Nevertheless, Mann acknowledged receiving “creepy” letters, and in particular had to fend off “one obsessive who lived in an adjoining state. This man was our worst fears come true, troubling our waking and sleeping hours for years.” The stalker repeatedly sought information on the children for six years, saying he was “bedridden with lovesickness for the Mann children” and that he wanted “a blessing from the Mann family’s holy presence.”
“This is the first time I’ve publicly referred, in any detail, to the shadow this weirdo cast for so many years,” Mann said. “I knew that it would only validate those critics who said I put my children at risk. And it will make their vengeful day when I admit now that they were in some measure correct.”
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Over 30 years after Mann’s photographs were first published, they are once again generating shock and controversy. “The exhibit as a whole effectively works to normalize pedophilia, child sexual abuse, the LGBTQ lifestyle, and the breakdown of the God-ordained definition of family,” said The Danbury Institute in its letter. “Children cannot consent to such photography, and displaying these images publicly only perpetuates their exploitation. Such actions degrade the values of our community, endanger the innocence of childhood, and contribute to a dangerous cultural shift.”
“This is more than a local issue,” the letter continues. “If such exhibits go unchallenged in Fort Worth, they risk becoming normalized nationwide. Christians and concerned citizens cannot stand idly by while child exploitation is reframed as art.”
The letter concludes by urging the museum to remove “these disturbing images from public display.”
ChurchLeaders has reached out to the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth and the Fort Worth Police Department for comment and will update this article in the event of a reply.
