Talia Herman captures rural California life
- Text by Andrea Kurland
- Photography by Talia Herman
Talia Herman is a San Francisco-based documentary photographer who trained at the International Centre of Photography in New York City. Now, having returned to her Northern California roots, she is reconnecting with the region’s residual counterculture through an ongoing project called Queer Habits about a rural non-profit founded by a group of drag queens that raises funds for the local community.
A regular contributor to The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg Businessweek and Wired, Talia’s assignment work sees her capturing the personal stories behind the headlines – from people living on the breadline to victims of rape – with the same sensitivity that defines her personal work, which centres mostly on family and friends in the Russian River Valley of Sonoma County.
In our ongoing series Answers On A Postcard – an existential visual Q&A – Talia sifts through an ambient archive of hot summer moments, butt-naked muses and rural California life and retrieves the stills that dig the deepest.
Answers On A Postcard #5
Who are you?
Talia Herman.
What does home feel like?
As an internal space: peaceful, connected.
What does faith look like?
I like the idea of it having something to do with an intrinsic compass.
What’s your greatest fear?
The Bell Jar.
What keeps you up at night?
Photomechanic…
What helps you sleep?
Making my dog put out and well-played antics.
What’s the meaning of life?
I know what it feels like, meaning that is, and I’d like to experience as much of it as I can.
Any vices?
Sure.
Keep up to date with Talia Herman’s work on her blog.
Enjoyed this article? Like Huck on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.
You might like
Reynaldo Rivera’s intimate portrait of queer Latino love
Propiedad Privada — Growing up during the AIDS pandemic, the photographer entered a world where his love was not only taboo, but dangerous. His new monograph presents inward-looking shots made over four decades, which reclaim the power of desire.
Written by: Miss Rosen
In photos: The newsagents keeping print alive
Save the stands — With Huck 83 hitting shelves around the world, we met a few people who continue to stock print magazines, defying an enduringly tough climate for physical media and the high street.
Written by: Ella Glossop
The quiet, introspective delight of Finland’s car cruising scene
Pilluralli — In the country’s small towns and rural areas, young people meet up to drive and hang out with their friends. Jussi Puikkonen spent five years photographing its idiosyncratic pace.
Written by: Josh Jones
The last days of St Agnes Place, London’s longest ever running squat
Off the grid — Photographer Janine Wiedel spent four years documenting the people of the Kennington squat, who for decades made a forgotten row of terraced houses a home.
Written by: Isaac Muk
How Japan revolutionised art & photography in the ’60s and ’70s
From Angura to Provoke — A new photobook chronicles the radical avant-garde scene of the postwar period, whose subversion of the medium of image making remains shocking and groundbreaking to this day.
Written by: Miss Rosen
Artifaxing: “We’ve become so addicted to these supercomputers in our hands”
Framing the future — Predominantly publishing on Instagram and X, the account is one of social media’s most prominent archiving pages. We caught up with the mysterious figure behind it to chat about the internet’s past, present and future, finding inspiration and art in the age of AI.
Written by: Isaac Muk
