Halloween Edition: Sternfeld v. Crewdson
"What the imagination can't conjure, reality delivers with a shrug."
I woke up thinking about this picture today — one of my favorites and, I suspect, one of yours too. My subconscious is dreaming about autumn and the Halloween holiday, which I don’t celebrate nearly as much as I should. And then I noticed that Stephen Leslie posted a new video to his excellent SHOW & TELL series — a closer look at photographers Joel Sternfeld and Gregory Crewdson. I could say more about what’s in store for you below, but I can’t say it any better than Stephen does, so I’ll keep things short and suggest you watch his insightful video essay when you have twenty minutes. Grab a coffee or tea, sit back, and enjoy.
I want to experiment with short-form posts like this from time to time and would love to hear from you. Do you like this format? Or would you prefer something more robust and long-form, like my previous post? Thanks in advance for sharing your thoughts with me. You can reply directly to this email. I’m looking forward to hearing from you!
Like the format. Thanks for sharing. Completely disagree with the premise of the video, which is like saying that fiction is worse than non-fiction in writing or that fictional films are worse than documentaries. Or that created art is worse than found art. One might think that Crewdson is shallow, but I contend that his work ranks among the top fiction creators. Brilliant. Great work elicits emotion and feeling and does so technically well. Certainly Crewdson's work does that.
FWIW...For me, this content would be better suited to SM. It seemed more like a share than a newsletter. In fact, I had seen this video shared by others already, though I am sure many may not have, too. Others may feel differently, but I personally would like to see something longer, and much deeper than both this and the IG post for content in newsletter format. Something not as easily shared in a few bytes on Social.