What Do We Look Like When We’re in Deep Sleep?

Photo: Estate of Ted Spagna/Courtesy of George Eastman House

Beginning in 1975, Ted Spagna (a teacher, photographer, and videographer) decided to capture the many faces and styles of people in slumber with a time-lapse camera mounted overhead. From what he referred to as a “God’s-eye view,” Spagna snapped intimate, chronological moments of everyone from himself to his friends and family, and later, of willing participants. His collection is filled with young kids, couples intertwined or sprawled out, newborns rolling about in cribs, and humans sleeping alongside their furry companions. Click through the slideshow for a first look at the snapshots culled for Spagna’s upcoming book, Sleep (Rizzoli). It will be released in September and offers an intimate, dreamy, fly-on-the-wall look at people in complete rest — captured in their most vulnerable moments, when posing is not even an option.