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.