Person of Interest: Samantha Lamb

If you’ve ever been greeted with a “Hello, my Darling Dear!” you’re probably talking to Miss Samantha Joelle Honey Lamb – photographer extraordinaire, and proprietress of the straight-out-of-a-fairytale farm Early Bird Acres. In an era where people, more often than not, tend to operate from a standpoint of jaded cynicism, Samantha Lamb offers a refreshing counterpoint. She’s as open and warm as they come, and her sweetness is as pure as the honey she produces on her farm.

1. Tell us how Early Bird Acres got started.

My lovely family says I was never born, just grown like a wheat field and they were lucky enough to harvest me. I always knew I wanted to live an Agrarian life. This all came to fruition when I happened to have enough money and a crazy enough mindset to start a homestead by myself. I already found myself going out to Hobart, America every weekend in order to create my art in it’s pastoral scenes, so it seemed like the perfect place. It was not as hard to start a farm as I thought it would be. It was ten times as difficult. Animals are born and they pass away. Gardens thrive and sometimes they are attacked by squash bugs.

My steadfast is the morning. I wake up at 4:30 nearly every morn to milk and start in on chores. I rejoice in the life and art that shall be created and kept for that single day. Sending love to the growing fields is also a daily task, but you never know what the season shall bring. I just feel honored to be perpetually inspired and to live the life I do.

2. Your favorite on-the-farm story:

There are way to many to say really. I try to share a different one every time. How about this one…

I was fortunate enough to have the band Umbrellas out to the farm for a week and the whole of the Black Watch studio guys. Also my good friend Daniel Foulks. I spent the whole of the week cooking for the guys and listening to lovely music coming from the barn. There was funny moment after funny moment. I can vividly remember Jarod Evans of Blackwatch running through one of the fields and chasing after my cow Blue with his microphone trying to get some natural sounds. Recalling the way the boys acted when I asked them to each hold a chicken for a capture still can make me roll. For a lovely evening we had the amazing Charlie Hall & Sethy McCarroll joining us for a day and having a cookout. We had a very tiny round grill and managed to fit over 5 large steaks on it’s top, and I must say, they were some of the best I have ever had. I also enjoyed watching the wonderful Nathan Price do a bit of painting while taking in the grandeur of the wheat fields.

The census woman happened to stop by while the band was visiting the homestead and it took her a while to be convinced that, yes, I was the only resident and no this is not a commune.

3. Tell us about your creative process as a photographer and artist.

Goodness gracious… my process. Honestly, I just take my fanciful daydreams and make them come to reality. If I wish to have a picnic in the middle of a wheat field, I am going to make that happen, and take a capture of it. I use only natural light and almost always a low DOF (the low depth of field is what can make one part of the image in focus, and the rest all blurry and dreamy). I am also constantly doing things to inspire myself, even if slightly crazy. In fact, yesterday I was feeling a bit low so I decided to go for a swim with the frogs in the pond, while leaving my dress on shore. Ohhhh my goodness…the pond is really nothing but red mud right now, so really it was more of a spa mud treatment, and all for free. All in all, this inspired me to take a picture in the next few weeks of myself wrapped in pumpkin vines, as if I had become part of the pumpkin patch on the west side of my cottage. So my advice to you is to go run in the rain. Roll through the fields and love the life you were given. Life is too short not to go swimming with the frogs. Go bake a pie you crazy darlin dear!!

4. Top five favorite local bands?

That is a heady question….oohhh yikes…
#1. Samantha Crain
#2.Broncho
#3.My Garden In the Morning
#4.Mark Philips & The Third Generation
#5.Sherree Chamberlain

5. Top five favorite films?

#1.Sweetland
#2.Legends Of The Fall
#3.Cold Mountain
#4.Cinderella (the old Disney version)
#5.Snow White (..Again…The old Disney version)

[Editor’s Note: The scene where all of the woodland creatures gather to Snow White and help her with her chores as she sings is said to be based on the real life experiences of Samantha Lamb.]

6. Top five favorite artists/photographers?

Well… I have a lot of artists I adore. Many of them are my good friends here in Oklahoma. So to be fair, I only want to mention one gent and he lives in the great state of Kentucky. His name is Wendell Berry and it is my dream to one day bake a pie with him and his wife. Go check out his books.

7. Favorite website?

Cheesemaking.com

8. Favorite 405 hangout spot?

I am really enjoying the New Botanical gardens. I went on a picnic there a weekend or so ago and I must say, lovely job OKC. I am sure I was not supposed to, but I kicked off my boots and waded in the new cobblestone river. I pretended that I was in Montana Salmon Fishing.

9. Favorite local restaurant?

Ludavine!!! If you have not gone there, then go. They support local farmers and make amazing food. Jonathon Stranger, you are the best☺

10. What projects are you working on right now?

I am working on a new project called “The Bucolic Series”. It is my way of combating our drought state of mind and creating lovely thriving scenes of green, grace and growth. Lots of agrarian images, fruit & Veggies. Also, lots of honey.

On the farm, I am working tilling up the ground around the main house and the guest cottage for more gardens & also working with my old man friend Rodger with his beehives. We hope to have a lovely spring, and between him and myself, have a lovely world of Jersey Milk and Wichita Honey.

Find Samantha Lamb online:

Samantha Lamb Photography
Samantha Lamb’s Blog