The Photographic Life
Sam Abell
National Geographic
Sam Abell was born on February 19, 1945, in Sylvania, Ohio, one of the flattest places in North America. In that landscape of uninterrupted horizons slight departures from level made an impression. Abell grew up to carry his vision of midwestern flatness out into the world, creating photographs with details and relationships we normally fail to notice: how the shape of a fallen tree trunk mimics a far-off hill, how a road or canoe prow or simply a pedestrian on a plaza may draw us forward to an ever-present horizon line and its vanishing point of possibility.
In 1967 Abell was awarded an internship at National Geographic. It was the beginning of a three-decade relationship with the Society. Photographic work for National Geographic magazines and books allowed him to work in the field for months and years at a time. It was this largely self-directed work that allowed Abell to develop and refine his lifelong artistic themes.
Preview
Though he is a documentary photographer, his themes are spiritual. For more than three decades, Abell has photographed qualities of space and time, connecting the intimate with the infinite. He has combined the passing moment with feelings of eternity. He has considered mortality. His careful compositions with their layered, improbable juxtapositions present a silent, compelling world: a patch of unmelted snow, seal pelts in the hold of a ship, a neon sign, a splash of water on an empty floor, a child sleeping on a sofa, an old photograph standing in a derelict building: each is unexpected, ambiguous, not fully fathomable.
These are faithful documentary photographs, yet they are ambiguous. Abell records everyday physical existence but simultaneously suggests other possibilities. It is this steady looking for another life behind things that characterizes his work.
