For the last few years Erik Madigan Heck has been taking photographs of his wife Brianna and their two young boys at their home in Connecticut. Photographs of starry nights, nude bathing, bosky daydreams and light on fabric and skin. A swirling, swimmy dream of life knitted together from sunshot afternoons, religious iconography and a passion for Degas and Klimt.
Now gathered together in a limited-edition book entitled The Garden, Madigan Heck’s photographs offer a strange, beautiful visual imaginary diary of a turbulent time in the photographer’s life as he and Brianna became parents and his beloved mother passed away after contracting Covid-19. This image, he explains, shows “Brianna holding Winston in front of our garage, just before a storm came through.”
To accompany the book, Madigan Heck has also made an album, Safe Passage (a collaboration with Dutch musician Frits Wentink, including contributions from Tilda Swinton) and two perfumes (The Garden and Safe Passage).
“Before you love someone—really love them—you can’t take a great picture of them,” Leanne Shapton suggests in an essay that accompanies The Garden. “Then, when you love them, better pictures start to emerge.”
What is this, really then? Isn’t it obvious? It’s a love story.
Erik Madigan Heck's The Garden is published by Damiani, damianieditore.com at £80. Photograph © Erik Madigan Heck
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