[updated below] I read a thought-provoking article this morning about child pornography laws and photography involving children. It’s a long one, but entirely worth reading.

I do think there is another, larger and probably more difficult question around artists using their children in their art, whether paintings, literature, or photography. Is it exploitation? I don’t know. Maybe. Sometimes. But I also think that if you want to express something about motherhood, parenthood, or childhood in our culture, at some point or other, your kid will come into the picture, literally or figuratively.

Photography seems particularly prone to exploitation. Last weekend, I watched Richard Avedon: Darkness and Light, and he says a few times that he is in control. The photographer is always in control. The people he photographed sometimes felt his portraits were cruel and unforgivable, and he himself wondered – retrospectively – if perhaps photographing his dying father was an act of hostility.

Heather Morton Art Buyer linked to Barbara Crane the other day, who apparently paid her children 35 cents an hour to sit for her, with the agreement that they would not be identifiable in the photographs of human forms. I find this fascinating. The other day, I also read this blog post on a similar topic.

I don’t know what to think of Tierney Gearon’s work. I haven’t seen enough of it, and I haven’t yet watched The Mother Project (which, incidentally, TVO is showing on Thursday, May 7, at 10 pm as part of the Contact Festival). But my initial response to what I have seen is troubled.

I don’t think it’s right to assume or take it for granted that my child belongs all to me, as raw material for my artistic expression. But I also don’t think it’s wrong to feature your children in your art either. As I said in my comment at Elizabeth Fleming’s, I’m starting to think that as long as you’re aware of the potential for exploitation, as long as you’re a little bit troubled by that potential, it’s probably ok?

This seems like an appropriate time to give you a sneak peak at the work I’m putting together from the first two years of my son’s life (which I first mentioned here a while ago). I’m alternating between two working titles, “Two-powered” and “Motherhood and Apple Pie.” If you have a smart way to put those ideas together, please share.

Edited to add: Suzanne Revy blogged on the very same topic, only far more eloquently than I did. Which is interesting, because when I wrote my post yesterday, I had meant to include a link to the recent interview on nymphoto with Revy, but I forgot before I hit publish.