You Have Nothing to Worry About
Melissa Spitz
Mom’s Mask, Pt. 1, 2011
“Here take these you’ll feel better.” Xanax from Mom, 2013
The Last Time Dad Remembers Mom Being ‘Normal,’ Seattle, 1996
“I fell down and broke my jaw,” 2012
Intravenous Fluids, 2014
“I need this for protection,” Mom’s BB Gun, 2014
All of Mom’s Prescriptions, 2014
Praying, 2013
Mom’s Vacation, 2013
Mom Crying After Her Friend Committed Suicide, 2014
Rocking Chair, 2013
Pool Day, 2015
Mom in the Passenger Seat, 2016
Mom’s Mask, Pt. 2, 2016
Hairbrushes, 2018
Mom After a Breakdown, 2017
You Have Nothing to Worry About is a complex and difficult body of work that can be broadly defined as documentary photography.
Since 2009, I have been making photographs of my mentally ill, substance-abusing mother. Her diagnoses change frequently—from alcoholism to dissociative identity disorder—and my relationship with her has been fraught with animosity for as long as I can remember. I am fully aware that my mother thrives on being the center of attention and that, at times, our portrait sessions encourage her erratic behavior.
The photographs are simultaneously upsetting and encouraging; honest and theatrical; loving and hateful. By turning the camera toward my mother and my relationship with her, I capture her behavior as an echo of my own emotional response. The images function like an ongoing conversation.
Melissa Spitz
Melissa Spitz (b.1988) is a working artist from St. Louis, Missouri, who currently resides in Brooklyn, New York. Melissa is the recipient of Magnum's Inge Morath Award, recognizing a female photographer under the age of 30. Additionally, in 2017 she was named TIME Magazine’s Instagram Photographer of the year. Her work has been described as ‘brutally honest’ and ‘shocking.’