Erinn Springer
Erinn Springer is a photographer based between Menomonie, Wisconsin and Brooklyn, NY. Embracing the character of rural life, her work is inspired by the cycles of the land, memory, and mortality.
Buy a copy of Erinn Springer’s book Dormant Season here
Interview by Joe Cuccio
What is your most vivid memory from life up until this point?
What a great question! I can’t recall a singular memory that supersedes any others, but when I think about my childhood, I see a lot of it from the perspective of my grandma’s front porch. Her house was sold after she passed, but I recently met the family that lives there now so I visited it for the first time in 15 years. Despite some remodeling, new inhabitants, and new decor, I still saw the rooms exactly as they were. As though she was there, sitting in her chair, and the low cupboard still contained all my fingerprinted toys. The house was so alive with my experiences, almost like it was waiting for me to visit. It was very special.
How did you get into art and what made you pursue it?
Being from a small town, my primary goal was always to travel. I considered doing journalism, but ultimately, my communication style was best expressed through visuals, not words, so photography made a lot of sense. I’ve always sought ways and reasons to experience new places and participate in the lives of others. The irony is that this work brought me home, not away from it.
Your book Dormant Season is an exploration of the prairie land your family has called home for many years. This seems to be different from your commissioned pieces. Could you talk about the challenges and advantages to doing both commissioned work and personal work?
Actually, I think my commissioned stories are typically very aligned with my personal work, some perhaps more abstractly than others, but all somehow relate to the culture and society of rural life or the relationship between people and nature. Commissions are a great way to begin sketches of stories or concepts I’ve wanted to explore in my personal work. It’s helpful from both a practical and conceptual perspective to be able to have supported, structured, time to work through ideas. It can be challenging in that a lot of great ideas don’t turn into great projects, so there’s always a reflective moment of needing to manage expectations. I have produced a lot of my favorite images while on an assignment though because there’s a heightened sense of pressure and commitment in a way that isn't always present when doing personal work.
Did you always know Dormant Season was going to be a book or were there other forms you saw/see the work existing in?
When I began shooting it, it wasn’t even a project at all, just a collection of pictures with my family with no objective. I got a commission from Heather Casey at The New York Times based on these initial pictures, which allowed the series to grow quite a lot. After that, I showed the work to several people who encouraged me to spend more time on it. This led me to a multi-year process and book. I’m so thankful for Matthew Genitempo, Bryan Schutmaat, and Jesse Lenz who supported the work by telling me not to publish it right away. Support can be seen as a road to immediate satisfaction, but I’m so glad that they believed in this work enough to tell me to give it extra time and attention. The work will also exist as an exhibition, but I wanted the work to be able to reach more people through the accessibility of a book. It’s the best way for the subjects to see and live with the work as well, which is important to me.
What was more challenging for you; creating images of strangers or creating images of relatives? Why
Both have unique challenges. The challenge with strangers is making them comfortable with my presence. The challenge with family is the emotional involvement of living and working together and sometimes being needed more in my other roles as daughter or auntie.
What was the most unexpected thing about making a photo book?
Honestly, the unexpected places I’d end up in pursuit of pictures. A 2-minute gas station conversation would turn into a 2-month collaboration and lifelong friendship with someone I never would have met otherwise. Everything and every place and person I met was unexpected and unpredictable. The awkwardness, openness, and vulnerability my subjects and I shared was one of the most rewarding experiences of my life.
Could you talk about the decisions to shoot in black and white, color, or mixing the two? What influences these ways of making?
I never considered making this work in color. When I began photographing this, I was very drawn to black and white for the tone and sense of memory it evoked. Just because it may be a matter of film selection or a saturation dial on a computer interface, it’s not always that simple. There’s often a deeper understanding of style and language as inherent to the photographer as their unique perception of the world. Granted, some are more fluid between palettes than others, but for me, black and white came naturally and created the atmosphere I was attracted to with this subject.
What is a common theme that you find yourself most attracted to throughout all your work?
Mortality.
Is there anything happening right now you’d love people to know? Are there any happenings in the future you’re looking forward to?
I’m just keeping myself open to experimentation. I needed to revisit my past through Dormant Season in order to be present for whatever is next.
