Doug DuBois’s pictures of his family from 1984 to 2005 are explorations of their personalities, relationships and class. A key image is “My Mother and Father at the Bar, London, 1990.” It shows his handsome, middle-age father looking at his mother with pleasure. A light on the table shines on his mother’s thin smile and introspective gaze, and casts shadows on the creases under her eyes. Her white blouse has a lace collar and pleated front, and is buttoned decorously at the throat.
Interestingly, in “My Sister Lise, Christmas Eve, Far Hills, NJ, 1984,” Mr. DuBois’s sibling is wearing a white blouse with a lace collar and pleated front, buttoned decorously at the throat, as she checks her outfit in the mirror. She stands in her bedroom with clothes strewn about, her face a template of teenage fashion angst. In “Lise in Pajamas, Ithaca, NY, 2005,” we see her 20 years later-after her mother’s suicide attempts, her parents’ divorce and her own marriage-standing by a door with her hands awkwardly holding its edge. All we see of her young son is his hand on the knob on the other side; the concern on her face this time is about more than what to wear.
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