Lauren at the Gorge, Reading, VT by Samuel F. Falls

The first time I wrote about Samuel F. Falls' work, I wasn't sure what to say. All I knew was that the images hit me in my gut in a good/disturbing kind of way.

I was somewhat relieved when I came across Johanna Reed's interview with Falls. If you're curious but a little speechless about the work, it's a must read. Part of the reason the work is so hard to write about is that Falls chooses highly personal, emotional subjects that are often linked only by Falls himself. But as in life, people, animals, and places reappear again and again, providing a semblance of history and the passage of time, and gradually instilling trust in Sam's way of working.

For his HHS! entry this time around, Falls selected three images of his ex-fiancee, Lauren, including a black and white portrait taken with expired film on the Valentines' Day the relationship ended. Falls' statment and images recall the tradition of photographers and their muses, historically including the likes of Edward Weston and Tina Modotti and more recently, Leigh Ledare and his mother. Falls revisited the photographs post-break-up and created a new project, Monocarpic. He writes:

The images here are from this series depicting Lauren over the course of our relationship from its beginning in May 2008 right up until our "disengagement" late this winter... The images I've collected range from places like New York City, Panama, Florida, and Vermont, and traverse extreme happiness to bold sadness. Though the photos were taken with my Crown Graflex, I never intended them as part of a preconceived project, which I believe has allowed me to capture the emotion and natural snapshot feel without loosing the pristine photographic capacity of a 4x5 camera. Lauren has helped me edit these images into a 112 page book, Monocarpic, which means "(of a plant) flowering only once and then dying".

The series also falls into context with Falls' larger body of work on his website.