Shelby Lee Adams (b. 1950, Kentucky).
The Home Funeral, Leatherwood, KY.
1990. Signed, titled, dated, and numbered #12/25 in pencil verso.
Silver gelatin print is 16"h x 20" w; archival frame is 26"h x 29" w.
Excellent condition.
Provenance: Estate of Dr. Gay Culverhouse, former President of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and author; Private Southern Collection.
Est. $2,500-$3,500 Ship: $65

One of Adams' best-known portraits of Appalachian life, The Home Funeral was described by the late photojournalist Mary Ellen Mark in 1993 as "one of the strongest documentary photographs of our time." The photograph is divided into two sections by the partition in the middle. On the right, the deceased was laid out in her own home. Her granddaughter lovingly placed a rose in her coffin. On the left, guests for the "country wake," who brought food and flowers, went into another room for refreshments and a long visit. Adams knew the deceased and spent more than seven hours with the family that day paying his respects, photographing family members around the coffin as was the custom, participating in a prayer service” before finally taking this photograph, which he had envisioned earlier that afternoon, at around midnight. Most of the prints from this long sold-out edition of 25 are in museum collections, including the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, CA; International Center of Photography, New York; Art Institute of Chicago; Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH; Museum of Contemporary Photography, Columbia College Chicago; and the Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum. Literature: Appalachian Portraits, photographs by Shelby Lee Adams, University Press of Mississippi, 1993. Illustrated on page 6 and on the verso of the book's dust jacket. Smithsonian Magazine, March 2010. Capturing Appalachia's Mountain People, by Abigail Tucker. A look back at The Home Funeral 20 years after Adams took the photograph.