Mulberry at SLOMA showcases a different dynamic of portrait photography 

The era of family photo scrapbooks is over.

Barry Goyette knows this, but something about them has always stuck with him, even as the world became digital.

"Back in the day, my friend and I would go into these antique shops in the area and find these little bins full of scattered scrapbook family photos," the San Luis Obispo-based photographer said. "You would find these photos out of the context of being in a collection—even with not knowing who was in them, they were always fascinating."

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• Courtesy Photo By Barry Goyette
• IN THE MOMENT Barry Goyette's Mulberry exhibition at SLOMA aims to capture the feel of old family photos while exploring the emotional dynamics between the photographer and the photographed.

That experience served as a source of inspiration for years, so when the San Luis Obispo Museum of Art (SLOMA) reached out about collaborating on potential exhibits, those old portraits were the first thing that came to his mind.

"I thought it was really interesting to see these stories of things that exist within every family photo, stuff we don't think about at first glance," he said. "There are these things that just naturally exist at the moment."

The Mulberry exhibit is Goyette's attempt to capture the energy taken for granted in those family photos while highlighting the relationship between photographers and the models they photograph.

The exhibit consists of almost 30 different-sized black-and-white images of models in various portrait poses, using different props and switching up expressions—all shot around the same mulberry tree in SLO.

Goyette said the exhibit aims to inspire the experience he had looking at those scrapbook photos years ago.

"It's my response and reflection of this vernacular I was seeing when we were looking through these photos at these antique shops," he said. "I wanted to explore that relationship between the two people interacting in the photo."

Mulberry opens at SLOMA on Feb. 2 and runs through June 3 as the start of what SLOMA Chief Curator Emma Saperstein said is a new focal point for 2024.

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• Courtesy Photo By Barry Goyette
• PERSONAL DIRECTION Photographer Barry Goyette said he let the people he photographed for his Mulberry exhibit lead the artistic direction of the shot with their movements and facial expressions.

"This show kick-starts a year at the museum that focuses more on photography in addition to the types of art we have had in the past," Saperstein said. "I am very proud we have been able to offer it to someone willing to do something unique with the concept."

Part of the concept is exploring what Saperstein considers to be a known quantity in portrait photography and the models who often work with photographers like Goyette.

"Barry was open about this dynamic from the very beginning," she said. "As someone who works with [professional] models who are often female, there is a power dynamic that is there—it's always been there, especially in contemporary discourse."

But the way Goyette enabled models to have agency and bring ideas, concepts, and even props in is what shatters the idea of conventional photo exhibit.

"They are bringing their own identities, which is not the standard for photographer-model relationship," Saperstein said. "To not only acknowledge that but explore more of that difference in traditional dynamic is important."

Exploring the model-photographer interaction wasn't always on his mind, Goyette said, but as the years passed, he understood that it was important to delve into that idea.

Goyette said putting Mulberry together took more than 15 years—with many of the photos taken in the first four and then sporadically since. He intended to wait a long time after he took them as a part of his artistic reflection.

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• Courtesy Photo By Barry Goyette
• ACTUAL AGENCY Most models in the portrait photography industry struggle with creative license, so Barry Goyette said the point of his Mulberry project was to allow them to tell a story on their terms.

"That's the unique aspect of this exhibit—that idea of letting time pass naturally and create these memories of the moment I shot these that I hope comes through for the viewer," he said. "I almost wanted to forget a little about the experience so that when I was going through them, I could pick the ones that stood out as antique."

Of course, for Goyette, many of these photos are of people he still knows and talks to regularly, which he said helps give the exhibit "family photo" vibes.

"A vast majority of these people I know well, and I have had the opportunity to know them well since I started taking these photos," he said. "For me as someone who was raised as an only child out in Santa Maria, these people in these photos became my family."

He hopes that those relationships shine through each photo and allow the viewer to understand a different side of him and the people in the portraits.

"It's a personal show compared to a lot of the things they would normally show at the museum, but it's nice to know that there is a place that will explore ideas like this," Goyette said. "There is a lot of emotion in the photos that highlights exactly how me and the model felt about the shoot, each other, and life in general in that moment." Δ

Staff Writer Adrian Vincent Rosas has that one Nickleback song stuck in his head. Help him get it out at [email protected].