Did the Domesticated pictures begin as specific scenes or as hazier ideas?
All the images for Domesticated are based on real stories of human and animal encounters. Most of the stories came from conversations with the residents of Matamoras, Pa., where the series was shot. Some of the stories are pulled from local papers. The story was the genesis for each image and then inspiration kicked in as I tried to distill the personal tension of the encounter and the greater significance of the setting into a compelling narrative. Some of those tensions were immediate and emotional while others were more subtle and required a degree of inspired embellishment. Did you ever create dioramas in school as a girl? What’s your reaction when you’re in the Museum of Natural History? I did create dioramas in school and enjoyed them quite a bit. I had an unfair advantage over many of my classmates in diorama production because my mother was director of the photo library at the United States Information Agency (USIA). She had access to some of the great images of American histor
