At this time of year, the holiday season often brings with it a heightened awareness of memory—family gatherings, inherited traditions, and objects passed down through generations. I find myself thinking about Krissy’s Present, Melissa Shook’s exhibition at Miyako Yoshinaga Gallery (December 2023–January 2024). The show felt inseparable from the season itself: intimate, reflective, and suffused with a quiet warmth shaped by time.
Shook’s most enduring subject is Krissy, her daughter and only child, born in 1965. Over the course of eighteen years, Shook photographed Krissy from early childhood through adolescence. These images function as both a maternal record and a personal reckoning. For Shook, photographing Krissy was not only an act of devotion but also a way of addressing the absence of her own mother, who died when Shook was twelve. That loss left a lasting rupture in her sense of being loved. While this subconscious longing may underpin Shook’s sustained attention to her daughter, she was careful not to burden Krissy with it, allowing her to grow freely and independently.
The exhibition’s sense of retrospection was heightened by the inclusion of personal objects—toys and Christmas ornaments from Krissy’s early years—displayed in quiet conversation with the photographs (installation image). The effect was deeply nostalgic and unexpectedly tender. These objects did not function as props or explanations, but as companions: material traces of a life once lived, echoing the emotional texture of the images themselves. Together, they created an atmosphere that felt especially resonant during the holidays, when family bonds and memories often come most sharply into focus.
As a single mother, Shook photographed her daughter with remarkable openness and care. At first glance, some images may surprise—particularly those in which Krissy appears nude. Yet through my conversations with Krissy, it became clear that these moments were experienced as entirely natural within the context of their shared home. The photographs do not perform vulnerability for the camera; rather, they reflect a space of trust, ease, and mutual understanding between mother and daughter. The body is neither sensationalized nor idealized—it is simply present, part of everyday life.
This sensitivity toward the body and toward self-representation becomes even more pronounced when viewed alongside Shook’s later work. In 1972, she began her daily self-portrait project, a sustained exploration of identity, appearance, and embodiment. Often photographing herself nude and incorporating performative gestures within domestic settings, Shook used the camera to question how female identity is shaped, seen, and claimed. In retrospect, it seems possible that this inquiry began earlier, within her photographs of Krissy. As Shook documented her daughter’s growth, she was also coming to understand her own role as a mother—perhaps even seeing herself reflected through the act of looking.
One photograph (featured above) from the exhibition remains especially vivid for me. Krissy, around three years old, stands on a table with her back to the camera, her body gently bent as her left arm reaches upward. The gesture suggests movement—almost a dance—caught mid-action. In the left background, a mirror faintly reflects her face and the echo of her motion, introducing a second, softer presence. Light pours in through a window, falling across Krissy’s body and animating the scene with quiet energy. The photograph feels alive with joy, curiosity, and freedom. In this moment, the viewer senses not only the child’s happiness, but also the mother’s attentive gaze—careful, loving, and deeply present.
What lingers most in Shook’s photographs is this maternal gaze, sustained by a shared space of trust. The images are intimate without being intrusive, emotional without becoming sentimental. They speak to the complexity of motherhood, to the act of witnessing another person grow, and to photography’s ability to hold love, memory, and time all at once. In the context of the holiday season, Krissy’s Present feels less like a retrospective and more like a gift.
