Photography and Narrative - The Story of Photo Artist Gregory Crewdson

As I enjoy film and television scriptwriting it comes as no surprise that for me one of the most enduring photography artists of recent times is the pictorialist Gregory Crewdson. His photographic expressionism focuses on methodically staged subjects placed in familiar settings that have often been distorted to some times engender a subtle surreal feel, and sometimes a very surreal feel . Despite what should be a comfortable experience, mainly due to the settings he chooses to work with, his photographs speak of something being out of place, something wrong, there is an uncomfortable truth hidden within each image. Crewdson has managed to produce images that are instantly identifiable and familiar territory as well as relatable.

Crewdson’s images are always captivating, aesthetically soft, fine and innocuous and all too often challenging. He takes advantage of digital manipulation to express his concepts. Much of his work has often been paralleled to stills taken from a film, there is a very distinct cinematic feel to his work. Crewdson admits that cinematography is influential to his work, for his 'Twilight' series (1999-2000) he states that Steven Spielberg’s Close Encounter’s Of The Third Kind was influential although not consciously . The challenge for the observer often arises not in trying to read what the photograph has captured but for the meaning of the photograph to be fully explained is found by reading what the picture is depicting.

There is a strong narrative element to Crewdson’s pictures therefore the reader becomes naturally curious and wants to know more. This is perfectly demonstrated in his latest collection 'Cathedral of the Pines' (2013-2016). His work does not generally fit into the realist theory of art and photography where ‘the camera should be used for the recording of life, for rendering the very substance and quintessence of the thing itself, whether it be polished steel or palpating flesh ’. However in a challenge to realism what he attempts to represent is something objective and real despite overt expressionistic subjective connotations. His photographs have managed to achieve a unique blurring of the distinction between reality and fiction and have made a significant contribution to photography in the expressionism arena.

Much of Crewdson’s most recent work has focused on American suburbia, suburban culture and a challenge to suburban social protocol, drawing many parallels with British suburbia . He seems to have a desire to look what’s behind the layer that each of us show to society, he wants to know what lurks behind our well crafted public presentation, what goes on behind closed doors; Crewdson’s trying to depict the full story of America’s suburban population, he wants the full picture. The versatility of his photographs is the reward for the viewer. If you imagine for a moment watching a screenplay or film, the entire experience is a guide, it tells you, more or less, where to go and which direction to think in. However with one of Crewdson’s photographs the viewer has a much wider scope for exploration, the viewer can take themselves places.

Crewdson’s pictures are a puzzle to be challenged by. They are saturated in enigma. What is going on in his pictures? What has happened before and after this moment in time that we now see laid out before our eyes? What is life like for the characters depicted in his photographs? Why are they there now? Where have they been? Where are they going? It would be interesting to create a moving image film of the before and after of these pictures. It would be fascinating to see what these people’s lives were like before and to see what is their background, their history, what is their class, what type of people are they now and what is their motive? It might be that what lies behind each image is a simple everyday relatable theme or it could be a very intricate set of circumstances which nonetheless could be wholly relatable to our own lives. However it may be that these images, despite there conventional settings, are so distant from the ordinary person’s life that, except for the marginal few, there is no correlation whatsoever. Perhaps Crewdson’s pictures are a mix of all these things.