Photography as Family Therapy - Books

In revisiting the family home he grew up in, Duane Michals (aged seventy at the time of this work) reflects on vivid memories stirred up by the bones of his old house. To him, 'This abandoned wooden box is, the cabinet where my family's curiosities are stored.' Duane Michals, The House I Once Called Home, 2003. Looking out at the scene beyond what was once his bedroom window, he recalls through a child's eyes, how he had perceived the world and what lay ahead. What had been his window to the rest of the world he now recognises as the 'soiled city' before him.

Duane Michals, The House I once Called Home, USA, 2003

Equally he tries to reconcile his memories of his immediate family with Sonny, 'When I was a boy, everyone called me Sonny', and the man that now stands in the same place and purveys those same memories with all his wisdom and clarity.  To give in to nostalgia protects Sonny. Without him, he too is dead. 

The sentiments he brought to this place - the longing to revisit his past and all its stories are now tinged by the actuality he has unlocked within these walls.His alcoholic father, his mother locked in a loveless marriage, the suggestion of his brothers suicide and his grandfather's King 'Lear' like presiding over his family. All this interspersed with recollections of Billy 'a tom too nosey' and the succession of his Grandmother's cats all named, '...Petunia, after her favourite posey', serve to sweeten the harshness of what was.

Duane Michals, The House I Once Called Home, USA, 2003

We have a tendency to idealise our childhood but in looking back Michals is faced with the reality of his dysfunctional family.Does he reject this notion or accept the reality which will ultimately re-write his childhood memories?

Duane Michals, The House I once Called Home, USA, 2003