Jul 9

Jul 9 Photographic Alphabet: A is for Holly Andres

The Fallen Fawn continues Holly Andres's examination of personal narrative and feminine subjectivity depicting short melodramas inspired by childhood memories. In large-scale, lush color images, Andres revisits the complexity of childhood, the fleeting nature of memory, and female introspection.

The Fallen Fawn is based on a personal account of Andres’ two older sisters who, as adolescent girls, discovered a woman's lost or abandoned suitcase near the river behind their house. Knowing it was a valuable treasure, they took it home, hid it under their bed, and when they could, often during the night, secretly dressed up in this "mystery woman's" belongings.

Afterlight: Belmont House © Holly Andres

Andres' photographic practice, in which she is both director and photographer, calls on the visual history of cinema, and often employs pacing conventions found in traditional narrative film. The Fallen Fawn is sequenced in such a way to illustrate the two parallel narratives of the sisters discovering the suitcase, and the consequences of their secret, and an implicit tale of the woman, “The Fallen Fawn,” revealed through her deserted belongings.