Who is Bill Finger?

Seattle-based photographer Bill Finger who works somewhere between photography and cinematography takes his inspiration from photographers Gregory Crewdson and Guy Bourdin. Much like their works, each of finger’s images in his series’ are constructed from top to bottom, specifically to be photographed as a whole. What’s interesting about his work is that each set is created in miniature and all staging and lighting is done through the lens. His images are supposed to be crime scenes or scenes that are ‘left’ after action has obviously taken place there.

‘Once photographed, the diorama is then destroyed,’ Finger states. ‘Through this process I create a temporary space which, like a film set, only lives on within the image.’

Although similar in look and feel to Crewdson’s film stills, the images in Finger’s ‘Previously’ series give a hint at what may have happened through a series of clues. So you know someone has been killed and with what. But that’s it. Finger’s images seem to have been taken after the event- in contrast to Crewdson’s where there is normally an element of suspense regarding what is about to happen. During his career as an assistant cameraman, Finger had time to observe how scenes move into one another and how real life can be moulded into a storyline. He also came to realise the differences and similarities between photography and cinematography.

I like how his images feel like they have been abandoned, it feels almost like a memory someone is retelling. The whole scene is set up and looks like a scenario however, there is no human interaction or presence which I think lures the audience in as they want to know what’s going on. This relates to my Tableau as I am not including any of the action in the story just the scene where nothing is happening. I think its interesting to discover things you don’t normally notice when there is action happening in front of it.

CINDY SHERMAN

Who is Cindy Sherman?

Cindy Sherman’s “Untitled Film Stills,” a series of 69 black-and-white photographs created between 1977 and 1980, is widely seen as one of the most original and influential series made. They are all narrative based tableau constructions that create archetypal women from movies, staged, lit and posed to convey meaning and message. Sherman starred in every image, making herself into art. Sherman still creates tableau scenes that use herself in the image in a managed way to expose a character and tell a story. In ‘film stills’ ( of films that never existed) we have these images that are hybrid between moving and still, narrative.

Sherman believes her work to be extremley conceptual and representational of the place of women in society. ‘Although i have never considered my work a feminist or as a political statement, it is certain that everything therein was drawn from my observations as a women in this culture’-Sherman.

She used Vintage clothing, wigs and make up to create the range of personas photographed in the moments of reflection, or conversation with people offset and outside of the frame. For me, one of the main things that makes her photographs look like film stills would be the ‘reactiveness’, the fact that in each image we start to build a whole story around one image, that doesn’t even exist. The fact its called ‘film still’ means we automatically try and decode the image to find out what happens in this scene/movie. The decoding of an image like this has to be quite obvious to ensure it lures the spectator in to discovering this mad up world.

GREGORY CREWDSON

Who is Gregory Crewdson?

Crewdson is a well-known photographer who creates big scale tableaux which resemble theatrical movie sets. His Photographs are very dramatic and he uses a crew of many people to help out with acting, lighting and other effects. I looked at a series by him called ‘Beneath the Roses’ which consists of 20 large scaled images which are extremely theatrical and very intense. Because of this, the images hold great similarities to still images taken straight from well-known films. The subject matter which Crewdson bases his work around explore ‘disturbing dramas at play within quotidian environment’. Included in this series of images are, anonymous townscapes, forest clearings and broad desolate streets. These places all hold connotations of mystery, tension, drama and wonder containing human scenarios. His work is almost tangible due to the atmosphere he creates as well as being visually pleasing. As well as this, he created another series of images called ‘Twilight’, this included forty photographs which again were large scale tableaux that explored the relationship between the domestic and the fantastical, both series exploring typical American behaviour.

Crewdson’s need to transform familiar suburban landscapes into places full of anxiety is evident here. From the filmic style and the things included, the audience can start to decode the image and by doing this, can start to create their own story in which they believe the image to be based on. By using one ray of extremely harsh lighting through the frame, compositionally tearing through he idea of a normal neighbourhood he plants the idea of fantasy, perhaps aliens into the image.

Why did I choose to look at Crewdson?

His images really stand out to me as the atmosphere is almost perfect to what I wanted to create in my own image. I love the dramatic lighting he uses really highlighting what he wants the audience to look at. I think this could be very helpful when lighting my own set as I would need different props to stand out to be able to tell my story. The atmosphere I think is also created by the dark gloomy says and smoke that lingers in the lighting. I will definitely look into different ways of creating that.

His Images:

Crewdson’s images have a very distinctive purple atmosphere with smoke around also creating a fairytale feeling to the pieces.

This last image shows how i would like the smoke and trees to look in my Photograph.

TOM HUNTER

Who is Tom hunter and What are these images about?

The images below belong to the Photographer Tom Hunter who is well-known in the medium. I focused mainly on his series ‘Person Unknown’. This series of images was taken in a street in Hackney where residents including himself made up a little community who were fighting eviction as squatters. The title of the series comes from the wording used in the eviction orders.

Why did I look at these images?

I looked at these images because not only did it show great examples of how a tableau can tell a story but it also allowed me to see how atmospheres can be created. The fact that we can see the persons room and belongings in these images allows us to get a sense of who this person is and how they feel. The atmosphere although comes across quite bright and colourful, to me, have an underlying dark tone. The lighting helps to create this, the shadows create a darkness almost like a doubt hanging around the people and the natural light used i think can be interpreted quite symbolically showing the contrast

His Images: