In Trudie, photographer Ben Larrabee brings together 51 portraits of his wife, Trudie Larrabee, made over the course of twenty years, between 1997 and 2017. Color and black-and-white photographs build an intimate, quiet narrative, where everyday life becomes a ground for artistic exploration.
Larrabee lives in Darien, Connecticut, and studied photography with Harry Callahan at the Rhode Island School of Design. It is Callahan—famous for his images of his wife, Eleanor, and his advice to “photograph what you care about”—who set the direction for Larrabee’s work. In Trudie, this idea is present in every shot: natural gestures, essential compositions, a rhythm born from the deep familiarity between photographer and subject.
Trudie appears in different moments—sunbathing in the Netherlands, doing Pilates, or pausing beside a lake lit by the water’s reflection. The images, often nudes, are not staged: they are fragments of life, spontaneous, free of poses. As Larrabee says, they are nudes of everyday life, without pretense or planning. In one of the most emblematic photographs, shot on the 61st floor of the Empire State Building, Trudie leans against a column, completely nude. “Ben said to me: ‘Go stand in front of that column.’ So, as I walked, anticipating his request, I undressed and hid my clothes behind it,” she recalls. The result is an image of disarming naturalness, where vulnerability and trust coincide.
Before returning to photography, Larrabee had a long career in graphic design, with an MFA from Yale and his own visual identity consulting studio. In 1993, after years of practicing Transcendental Meditation, he returned to photography and founded Ben Larrabee Photography LLC, dedicating himself to portraiture. His sessions are never planned: people move freely, interacting in their own spaces, while he captures moments of authenticity.
“It’s a tradition in art, that of the artist and the muse,” Larrabee says. “When I want to experiment with visual ideas, I always return to Trudie.” In this collaboration built on trust and curiosity, the photographer finds the freedom to explore, transforming shared time into image.
Trudie is, above all, an act of trust. A visual diary that tells of a life shared, of complicity, and of time. It is an homage to the tradition of those who photographed or painted their muse not to display her, but to better understand themselves. A project that speaks of love, of gazes, and of the beauty that reveals itself only when one is not trying to show it.
© Ben Larrabee
