Mary Ellen Mark: Indian Circus

Mary Ellen Mark: Indian Circus is on at the Colorado Photographic Arts Center from September 25 through November 14, 2026. It's the first solo exhibition of her work here in Colorado, presented by CPAC with support from Charles Cannon and Laurie Baxter.

Mark (1940-2015) spent over five decades photographing people whose lives were profoundly different from her own, publishing photo-essays in LIFE, The New Yorker, Rolling Stone, and Vanity Fair. Her portrayals of Mother Teresa, Indian circuses, and the brothels of Bombay grew out of many years of work in India: she first traveled there in 1969 and returned repeatedly, spending six months in 1989 with eighteen different circus companies.

What makes this particular body of work stand out is where she looked. Rather than the performance itself, she focused on the rehearsals, the daily work, and the quiet moments in between. She described the Indian circus as "a metaphor for everything that has always fascinated me visually," and that's exactly what you'll find on the walls—the life that happens when the curtain is down.

Mark was widely recognized for her documentary eye, receiving the 2014 Lifetime Achievement in Photography Award from George Eastman House and the Outstanding Contribution Photography Award from the World Photography Organisation. You can catch the exhibition at CPAC, 1200 Lincoln St, Denver, CO 80203, running from September 25 to November 14.