Alec Soth has got a thing for fabled bodies of water. His first book, Sleeping By The Mississippi (Steidl, 2004; named by PDN one of the top 30 books of the past five years), featured portraits, interiors and landscapes Soth shot as he followed the shores of the American river. His new book, Niagara (Steidl, 2006), finds the 35-year-old photographer exploring the region surrounding America’s most celebrated waterfall and traditional honeymoon destination.

Driving around in a van with quotes from Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita and lists of subjects and items he wanted to find taped to his steering wheel, Soth captured motels, couples, wedding gowns, nudes, love letters and other images that focus on the myths of romance that envelop the area. His resulting book is a sobering, awkwardly beautiful, heartbreaking venture into the realities of love and “happily ever after.”

In the two years since Soth published Sleeping By The Mississippi and was featured in the 2004 PDN’s 30, he has become a nominee of the Magnum cooperative and landed magazine assignments. PDN interviewed Soth while he was overseeing the publishing of Niagara in Germany.

How did you come up with the idea for Niagara?  

It was a mixture of things. Like the Mississippi, Niagara Falls is another iconic body of water. The place just conjures up a certain feeling when you think about it. But this feeling, to me, is quite different than my response to the Mississippi. Instead of dealing with dreams and freedom, Niagara Falls allowed me to investigate love and desire (and its aftermath).

{...}

How did Lolita tie into all of this for you?  

When I’m driving, I often listen to audio books. One time (I think during the Mississippi project) I listened to Lolita. It is a great driving book. I love all of those scenes of Lolita and Humbert going to different motels and cottages. The book just evoked a certain kind of feeling that I really responded to. This idea of disastrous desire amidst vernacular Americana – it somehow made its way into my pictures. Moreover, Nabokov is such a great colorist. The quote I use at the beginning of the book - the yellowish soles of her long toed feet – it is the kind of thing I’m always looking for in my pictures. I thought it was sort of a pity that [director Stanley] Kubrick made the movie in black and white. It should have been done in Technicolor.

{...}