Why Some Photos Feel More Powerful Over Time: Black Box by Dona Ann McAdams
Welcome to this edition of [book spotlight]. Today, we uncover the layers of 'Black Box: A Photographic Memoir,' by Dona Ann McAdams (published by Saint Lucy Books). We'd love to read your comments below about these insights and ideas behind the artist's work.
A photo’s true impact isn’t always visible the moment it’s taken.
Dona Ann McAdams knows this better than most—she spent five decades capturing protests, underground art, and everyday moments that later became history.
Her new book, Black Box, is built from lost and rediscovered negatives, proving that time can change the way we see a photograph.
Some pictures are important the second they are taken—others need years to reveal their real weight.
But why do some photos grow stronger with time?
McAdams’ archive shows that memory, history, and context shape the meaning of an image long after the shutter clicks.
A protest photo might capture a single afternoon, but years later, it becomes part of a much bigger story.
A simple portrait can turn into a record of someone before they were famous, before the world changed around them.
Black Box proves that photography is about preserving what we don’t yet understand.
Black Box: A Photographic Memoir
Dona Ann McAdams’ Black Box: A Photographic Memoir is a powerful collection of five decades of photography, bringing together her unseen negatives, iconic images, and personal reflections in a way that redefines the role of photography as both art and historical record.
Spanning from the 1970s to today, Black Box offers an intimate look at American activism, underground performance art, and everyday life, documenting moments that were once personal but have since become part of history. McAdams’ lens has captured AIDS protests, LGBTQ+ liberation, avant-garde theater, and the people who shaped cultural movements long before they were recognized.
What makes Black Box unique is its structure—McAdams pairs her photographs with short, poetic reflections she calls “ditties”, adding a deeply personal layer to each image. The book also plays with the idea of archiving and rediscovery, featuring images that sat unseen in her darkroom for decades before revealing their true significance.
From intimate portraits to radical political moments, Black Box is a time capsule of resistance, art, and the hidden power of forgotten images. (Saint Lucy Books)
Overview of the project: What inspired you to compile five decades of your photography into Black Box, and how does the title reflect the themes explored in the book?
The book explores questions, feelings and emotions that were buried deep in my subconscious. I started looking over my archive after my younger brother, Tom, died in 2013. I was trying to come to terms with the scope of my work and all the black photo boxes stacked up in my studio, many decades worth. There’s 16” x 20” archival boxes and 8” x 10” boxes and 11” x 14” boxes, all of which are labeled by portfolio. I was trying to organize them all in preparation for finding them a permanent home in a collection or museum. Looking back at a lot of early work prompted memories of places, persons, things. I started writing down these memories. They came out link songs or small prose poems. I called them “ditties” because I didn’t take them serious at the time. But for some reason I needed to write them down, often in my darkroom with a soft number four lead pencil, the same type of pencil I use to write on the back of photographic prints.
Looking at my work this way, then delving even deeper the negatives and contact sheets—negatives I’d never even printed before—allowed me to view my work in a different way, to see the through line, the story it was telling, without regard to specific portfolio or project. I kept finding surprises, things I’d either forgotten about, or had never seen in the first place in the negatives. It was as if they’d been waiting there in the silver for three or four decades waiting to be discovered. They were like little gems that triggered a flood of stories. Hence, the photographs and the text that either go together, or sometimes don’t go together. It’s all the same piece. Things found in a black box. The black box of a camera, the black box of memory. the black box of what happened after the accident. The evidence. It came out in silver gelatin and pencil on paper.
You mentioned rediscovering forgotten negatives and the stories they revealed. How did this process shape your understanding of your creative journey and the broader narrative of your work?
Mining the archive offered two things. A clear understanding of where I’d been and what I had photographed. And evidence of a deeper nature of my journey…which is to say, I had witnessed tremendous change in the United States. From abortion becoming legal, to Gay and Lesbian Rights beginning to happen, the devastation from AIDS, the fight for research and support for people living with HIV. Censorship in the arts. The war in Central America, the toppling of the trade towers, the subsequent wars in the Middle East. The election of the first African American president, Gay marriage, the election of Donald Trump, and the potential loss of everything I’ve fought for as an activist my entire life.
What was the most surprising thing you found?
A few great photographs I’d missed. An encounter I’d forgotten about that I had with the actor John Malkovich, and another with Richard Hambleton, the Shadow Man, one summer in the eighties at the Berlin Wall. A beautiful never-printed portrait of Diamanda Galas. But more than anything I found how fortunate I was to live an incredibly rich life, full of diverse communities and fierce political changes.
Artistic vision and approach: Your photographs span diverse subjects, from activism to performance art to personal memories. How do you decide which moments to capture and include in this memoir?
For me there’s no difference between the personal moments and the political moments. Activism is the root of all my work.
Were there specific instances during the curation of Black Box where this intersection surprised or deeply resonated with you?
When I started mining the archive I wasn’t much surprised at what I found in terms of politics. The surprises came from a more personal and intimate place. In particular, the photo of my father in the Liberty Diner in Centereach, New York. I don’t think that photo would have been found if I hadn’t been working on this project. It was taken in the summer of 1978. He died four months later.
Storytelling in photography: The book combines images with your lyrical “ditties.” How do these written reflections enhance the narrative and emotional depth of the photographs?
This project was years in the making. Looking at negatives came first. Thousands of contact sheets over the decades. Mining the archives, so to speak. Then I selected over 300 prints for a first round. Plus pages and pages of my “ditties.” I stared to pair the ditties with the photographs, and it became clear with time which ones worked well, and which didn’t, and which I needed to keep and what darlings I needed to kill.
The ditties and photos should work independently of one another. They’re both solo artists. But when they sing together: that’s when the magic happens. That’s my hope at least.
You should be able to open the book at any point and either read the text or look at the photograph and be surprised or thrilled or have some reaction. Photo and text should be able to stand on their own.
Challenges and perseverance: Documenting five decades of cultural and personal history must have been daunting. What challenges did you face while curating this collection, and how did you overcome them?
The challenges came in making the work in the first place as a woman with no money.
As for the problems with making the book, it was letting go of stories or images I loved but didn’t serve the project as a whole.
Role of the photographer: You’ve described yourself as a “collage artist who works with time and light.” How does this perspective shape your approach to photography as both an art form and a historical document?
My objective as a photographer is always to make a photograph that is good and interesting and satisfies that old Szarkowski criteria. I’m interested in making a good photograph but never at the expense of a person or situation. I’m very careful about photographs I choose not to take. I remember those. I learned the key to being successful as a photographer at 20 years old in suite 16 at the San Francisco Art Institute from a man named Hank Wessel. Hank, who was my teacher, told us: “Carry your camera with you at all times. if you don’t always have your camera with you, you’re going to miss something.” For me that meant wearing my Leica all the time. It wasn’t that I went out to look for photos. I went out to live my life. The photos were part of it. It was just another way of being present, of walking around with a second set of eyes.
Today, I might not wear my camera when I’m in the barn or milking my goats, but I wear it when I’m hotwalking a race horse.
Connection with the audience: Your work captures iconic moments and figures alongside intimate personal experiences. What do you hope viewers will take away from this blend of public and private narratives?
When I started to make photographs in 1974, I was using black and white film. Around that time many folks were shifting to color film, but I always liked the abstraction of black and white and it’s the way I saw things, in black and white. I was committed as well to keeping the same camera and shooting with it the way I knew how. Then around the turn of the century, or right before, a lot of people shifted away from analog and started shooting with digital cameras not film. I made the conscious decision then to stick with what I knew and loved. Digital was great for most folks. It really democratized photography, especially once it turned every phone into a camera, and everyone had access to making their own photos. That was a wonderful thing, but for me it made working as a photographer difficult. I worked in the theater as a gun for hire and often had to turn around my prints in a few hours to make a deadline for the New York Times. Shooting digital would have made that turn-around instantaneous. But photography for me was never about instant gratification or editing on the spot. I remember in those early days watching other photographers shooting live dance or performance in the theater. They’d shoot and check the back of their cameras, shoot and check, and edit right there as the performance was going on. I don’t know how they stayed in the present or responded to the dance and looked at their own photos at the same time. For me photography is about being in the moment, in the present tense, but if you were looking back at what you just shot, you were in the past tense and missing what was happening in the present. I also remember photographers leaving early in a performance once they had what they needed. It happened more than once, someone looking at their camera while the performance was going on and then leaving. It wasn’t for me.
I’m grateful for the advent of digital because it made me choose to continue my analog practice. It deepened my commitment and made me embrace the wet process even more so. There’s something magical about the gap of time that happens in analog between the time you take a photograph and the time it gets processed. It’s not so different than what happens with memory. The moment sits in the camera, in the roll of film, and you may not process it for a few weeks or a month, or in my case, sometimes, even a few years. It sits there in the silver and when it comes to light, when you process it, you’re already in a new place and can see it differently. I love the time lag that happens with analog. The moments frozen in time, in a negative sleeve or on a contact sheet. That’s what was so inspirational about the work for Black Box, finding these moments, decades later, and bringing them back to life....as if they were some kind of freeze-dried tissue…or sea monkeys. Add a little water and time...and look what they become. A whole lived memory.
Advice for aspiring photographers: For those looking to create a photographic memoir or long-term documentary project, what lessons from Black Box would you share to inspire their work?
Always walk around with a camera. Photograph what interests you. Photograph the life around you. Keep notes. Write down what you see, what you’re photographing. Look at photography. But also look at a lot of other art. Go to museums. Look at painting. Look at sculpture. Experience live art and performance. Walk in nature. Read a lot of poetry.
To discover more about this intriguing body of work and how you can acquire your own copy, you can find and purchase the book here. (Saint Lucy Books)
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