Giant Willow Oak is a visual meditation by Amanda Sauer, documenting a long and attentive observation of a single tree over the span of more than a year. Published by L’Artiere, the book unfolds as a study of time, change, and the quiet intensity of looking.
Working with an analog camera, Sauer walked around the tree repeatedly, always counterclockwise—mirroring Earth’s rotation—and capturing the subtle shifts in bark, light, leaves, and shadow. The series spans the course of 2021 and 2022, culminating in the final images taken just before the tree’s removal in October 2023.
Far from being a botanical study, Giant Willow Oak is a reflection on impermanence and presence. It invites viewers to slow down, to pay attention to small changes, and to consider what it means to witness something as it disappears. The photographs are intimate and precise, holding within them both a quiet reverence and a sense of inevitable loss.
Printed in a limited edition, Giant Willow Oak becomes a space of memory—an archive of time as filtered through one gaze, one place, and the slow passage of seasons.
