About Samm Blake – Samm Blake – New York Wedding Photographer

Samm Blake is an Australian photographer based in New York City. Combining a fine art photography & journalism background, a strong love and appreciation for film photography along with a skilled and sensitive eye for portraiture, her images garnered acclaim for their honesty, vulnerability, and unfeigned connection to its subjects. She photographs wedding celebrations from large multi day events to elopements across the world, from Iceland to Indonesia, the United Kingdom to the United Arab of Emirates and beyond, always bringing a unique editorial and artistic sensibility to the wedding world.

With twenty years of professional experience, Samm’s photographic journey has assumed a rich and varied path. Samm has been named one of the top wedding photographers in America by Condé Nast Brides and named in the top ten wedding photographers in the world by American Photo Magazine. Samm's work has been featured in Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, Martha Stewart Weddings, Brides, C Magazine and publications across the globe.

ARTIST STATEMENT

I seek out documenting the unique ways couples celebrate love and my goal is to always capture the day purely, joyfully and honestly. I’m thankful that my work allows me to pursue my passion for photography and let's me travel to unique places to connect, witness and document the many different ways people come together to celebrate.

I think of my images as the building blocks of an unfolding story. They’re little moments that capture the honesty and pure emotion of a wedding day, focusing on subtlety over fanfare and vivid feeling over a visual who’s-who. What you’ll find in my work are quiet interactions, stolen glances, laughter or tears in instances when people are so present they forget they’re being photographed.

Overall, I view each wedding as a collaboration with my couples. I don’t see myself as a distant observer or documentarian, focusing only what’s in front of me - I am capturing how it felt to be there too.

When my couples are looking back on their photographs I want them to see a genuine depiction of who they are. I’m interested only in real smiles, sincere expressions, unprompted emotions. I feel that is what gives my photographs the poetic simplicity they’re known for.

I love the moments when people are truly able to let down their guard and let go of their inhibitions. My intention with every shoot is to help create a sincere and intimate space where that can happen - where the people in front of my lens can be themselves even amongst the chaos and anxiety of a wedding.

It’s a privilege to create images that families will keep forever and above anything and everything else, I want them to look at their photographs and remember, even decades down the line, the joy and love they felt on that day. I want to create photographs that matter.