Gregory Crewdson, Blue Velvet

Crewdsons photographs look like stills from a film. He employs a whole crew of people to create sets and work behind the scenes, much like a movie set would.

Crewdson has admitted he is heavily influenced by David Lynch’s Blue Velvet. He knew the ideas of David Lynch and went from his ideas to create new ideas.

'Lynch is Crewdson's most obvious source of inspiration. When he was a graduate art student in the mid-1980s, the photographer says he was struck by Lynch's masterpiece, Blue Velvet. "I had the distinct feeling it would change me," he says. Lynch's vision of a dystopian world beneath the suburban idyll of Lumberton - in particular, the unforgettable 15-minute scene in which Kyle MacLachlan hides in a cupboard while Dennis Hopper acts out his S&M fantasies with Isabella Rossellini - left a lasting impression: "I love everything about it - the set, the attention to colour, light and mood."'

http://arts.guardian.co.uk/features/story/0,,1887082,00.html

The scenes in Blue Velvet are set in the suburbs of America. There is a lot of mystery and disturbing behaviour hiding underneath the town. This is something Crewdson suggests in his work, the darks and lights that he uses and the colours he chooses for his photographs.

There are a lot of browns and plain colours in Blue velvet as there is in Crewdsons work, there is rarely any pattern on walls, he opts instead for a plain wall, or if there is pattern it is old and faded. His colours are not bright and modern.

Comparing the street scene in Blue Velvet (top image) and a photograph from Crewdsons Beneath the Roses (bottom image)you can see how Crewdson may have taken elements of Lynch’s work to create his own image.

Gregory Crewdson Desperate Housewives

Crewdsons work reminds me of the TV show Desperate Housewives, I haven’t really watched the programme that much but seeing his photograph (left) Untitled photo from Crewdson's series Beneath the Roses (2003-2005) reminded me of the snippets I have seen of the TV show. The fact that Crewdson is so heavily influenced by film sets is perhaps a reason why I am instantly reminded and the fact that it is set in an American suburb. Desperate Housewives was first shown in 2004 so it was right in the middle of Crewdson photographing his Beneath the Roses series.

After looking into the TV show a bit more I discovered a character who was quite dark and had many secrets and was played by Kyle MacLauchlan. He also played the part of Jeffrey Beaumont in Blue Velvet ( a film said to heavily influence Crewdson) and he also played the detective in Twin Peaks (another David Lynch film/TV series).

Gregory Crewdson Edward Hopper

Gregory Crewdson is famously influenced by is Edward hopper.

"Hopper has been profoundly influential to me as an artist," writes Gregory Crewdson. "Emerging from a distinctly American tradition, Hopper’s work deals with ideas of beauty, sadness, alienation, and desire. I think it is now virtually impossible to read America visually without referring back to the archive of visual images created by artists who found inspiration in Hopper’s paintings. His art has shaped the essential themes and interests in the work of so many contemporary painters, writers, and, above all, photographers and filmmakers."

http://www.wcma.org/press/06/06_Hopper_Crewdson.shtml

Hopper was born in 1882 and died in 1967 and Crewdson was born in 1962. Despite so many years being between them they both deal with the same subject, the American Suburbs and the American way of life. Crewdson is so heavily influenced by the lighting Hopper uses and the sense that what is being shown is only a part of a whole story.

Shown above (bottom image)is a painting by Edward Hopper. It is called “Morning Sun” (1952). It is just filled with so much light, illuminating the wall and the thigh of the woman sitting on the bed, yet you wonder what has just happened. What is about to happen? This is just part of a whole story. What is she looking at? What is she thinking?

Crewdson has obviously taken these ideas on board in his photography. Shown above (top image) is an untitled staged photograph from the book Twilight by Crewdson. A woman is kneeling in her kitchen surrounded by a garden full of flowers.

The light is so important here as it floods into the room. Like with Hoppers figure the woman is sitting staring into a nothingness. You wonder what has just happened. The character has been captured just before or after the climax of the scene.

Gregory Crewdson, Philip-Lorca diCorcia

There are other artists who work in similar ways to Crewdson or who have the same views and ideas. Crewdson did a show with eight other artists in October 2006 called Twilight: Photography in the Magic Hour.

Philip-Lorca diCorcia is a photographer who participated in this show. His work combines a documentary tradition with the fiction that is advertising and cinema. He creates a link between reality and desire.

"It might be said that twilight is a muddled form of clarity. The warm glow that suffuses the ' golden hour' in Los Angeles acts to filter the grim realities, the outright lies, the self-deceptions, which allow Hollywood, and by extension, America to flourish. 'Twilight' provides the rose-coloured glasses that make it possible to see out but not see in.' "
Philip-Lorca diCorcia

http://www.vam.ac.uk/collections/photography/twilight/diCorcia/index.html

diCorcia also uses artificial light to carefully stage his photographs. He finds random people on the street and pays them to pose in his photographs. In the photograph above he has used Brent Booth, a 21 year old from Des Moines, Iowa. He paid him $30. He puts all this information in the title of the photograph. Ifind it interesting that whilst he stages the pictures the work is also has that element of truth in it as he is using random people and not a model that has been carefully selected.

Gregory Crewdson

Gregory Crewdson is an American photographer born in 1962. He studied photography at SUNY Purchase and also has a Masters in Fine Art from Yale University where he has been a member of the faculty since 1993.

Crewdsons photographs are said to be the fine line between phtography and cinema. His work is heavily staged and each photograph requires a whole crew much like a feature film would. Crewdson employs assistants, technicians, make up, wardrobe, and a post production team. He also uses large format cameras and he has a whole selection of lights.

The photographs he stages are about the moment of transition between the before and after of a scene. You know something is about to happen or has just happened but what? Crewdson has said he is not intereted in the before and after and prefers to leave the story untold. It could be said that his photograph can tell the whole story anyway, as the viewer could look for clues as to what has happened or what may be about to happen.

Light plays a very large part in Crewdsons work. It streams through windows, it glows from the sky, it even shines up from the floorboards. The light is worked out in a very technical way. It is used to create a narritive code, different forms of light tell different stories.

One photograph that I do like is of a man on his hands and knees surrounded by streams of lights shining up through holes in his floorboards. (above, bottom image). It is from his Twilight series 2001 and is untitled. The man does not look mad just confused, he is looking suspiciously at these floods of light. I am wondering why he has made the holes. I can only assume he made the holes as there is a toolbox and tools next to him. Why is there light shining through? Is that what he is wondering too? Aliens spring to my mind

Crewdson is good at leaving clues in his photographs. In this photograph the cupboard door has been left open. It looks very neat inside and this may have been where the toolbox is kept. I can see into another room where the light is much brighter and the coffee table next to the single chair has two glasses on it. Was there somebody else there?

These are all clues that Crewdson leaves for us to look at and think and wonder. What even made this man start to saw holes in his floor? Is he looking for the source of the light or is he possessed by whatever is making the lights, again aliens spring to mind.