About
What I am interested in is that moment of transcendence, where one is transported into another place, into a perfect, still world.
—Gregory Crewdson
Gregory Crewdson’s photographs have entered the American visual lexicon, taking their place alongside the paintings of Edward Hopper and the films of Alfred Hitchcock and David Lynch as indelible evocations of a silent psychological interzone between the everyday and the uncanny. Often working with a large team, Crewdson typically plans each image with meticulous attention to detail, orchestrating light, color, and production design to conjure dreamlike scenes infused with mystery and suspense. While the small-town settings of many of Crewdson’s images are broadly familiar, he is careful to avoid signifiers of identifiable sites and moments, establishing a world outside time.
Born in Brooklyn, New York, Crewdson is a graduate of SUNY Purchase and the Yale University School of Art, where he is now director of graduate studies in photography. He lives and works in New York and Massachusetts. In a career spanning more than three decades, he has produced a succession of widely acclaimed bodies of work, from Natural Wonder (1992–97) to Cathedral of the Pines (2013–14). Beneath the Roses (2003–08), a series of pictures that took nearly ten years to complete—and which employed a crew of more than one hundred people—was the subject of the 2012 feature documentary Gregory Crewdson: Brief Encounters, by Ben Shapiro.
Photo: Juliane Hiam © Crewdson Studio
#GregoryCrewdson
Exhibitions
Gregory Crewdson: An Eclipse of Moths
Gregory Crewdson discusses his new work with actor Cate Blanchett.
Gregory Crewdson: Cathedral of the Pines
In his latest series of large-format color photographs, Cathedral of the Pines, Crewdson takes the viewer to the forests of Becket, Massachusetts—the locale of his earliest childhood memories and his home since 2011.
Fairs, Events & Announcements
Lecture Series
Gregory Crewdson
2021 Yale Photo Pop Up Lecture Series
The Yale Photo Pop Up Lecture Series has returned for a second year. The series was started in 2020 by Gregory Crewdson, director of graduate studies in photography at the Yale School of Art, as a response to the shift to online learning. The biweekly talks feature a wide range of guest speakers, including leading figures of contemporary film and photography, announced twenty-four hours in advance of the event. In each half-hour session, Crewdson asks the guest questions about artistic practice and the anticipation of an end to the pandemic crisis. The series is free and open to the public. Space is limited and will be granted on a first-come, first-served basis.
To find out about upcoming lectures, follow @yalephoto or @crewdsonstudio on Instagram.
Still from “Yale Photo Pop Up Lecture Series presents Jeff Wall”
Lecture Series
Gregory Crewdson
2020 Yale Photo Pop Up Lecture Series
Gregory Crewdson, director of graduate studies in photography at the Yale School of Art, is opening his 2020 MFA Photography Pop Up Lecture Series to the public while the Yale campus goes online, hosting twenty-eight question-and-answer sessions with leading figures of contemporary film and photography on Zoom. Featuring a wide range of guest speakers including William Eggleston, Spike Jonze, Tilda Swinton, and Kara Walker, the series opens up a conversation about how to find artistic inspiration in this moment of great change. To watch previous talks, visit www.art.yale.edu.
Still from “Yale Photo Pop Up Lecture Series: Tilda Swinton”
Design
Namacheko and Gregory Crewdson
AW20 Collection
Belgian fashion label Namacheko is launching a new collection inspired by and featuring Gregory Crewdson’s photographs. The garments were shown for the first time at Namacheko’s Fall 2020 runway show in January at Espace Niemeyer, the French Communist Party headquarters in Paris, designed by Oscar Niemeyer. The clothing will be available later this year at select retailers, including the Gagosian Shop.
Dress from Namacheko’s Autumn/Winter 2020 collection featuring an image from Gregory Crewdson’s Hover series
Museum Exhibitions
Opening this Week
Road Rage
June 25–September 20, 2021
The Church, Sag Harbor, New York
www.sagharborchurch.org
Road Rage brings together works by twenty-four artists who use the car as subject or material. Dating from the 1960s to the present, the paintings, photographs, sculptures, drawings, and animated film on display consider automobiles as tools of travel, consumption, and commerce, and as icons of wealth, class, leisure, power, destruction, and pollution. Work by Gregory Crewdson and Richard Prince is included.
Gregory Crewdson, Back Lot, 2018–19 © Gregory Crewdson
Closed
The Essl Collection
Photography
December 7, 2020–April 5, 2021
Albertina Modern, Vienna
www.albertina.at
Complementing an overview of the Essl Collection, which has been held by the Albertina since 2017, the lower level of the Albertina Modern is presenting a special exhibition of works from the Essl Collection’s photographic holdings. In addition to notable examples of contemporary photography, the show particularly focuses on representatives of the Becher School, who studied under the influential photographers Bernd and Hilla Becher at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf in the 1970s. Work by Gregory Crewdson, Andreas Gursky, and Cindy Sherman is included.
Gregory Crewdson, Untitled, 2004 © Gregory Crewdson
Closed
Vantage Points
Contemporary Photography from the Whitney Museum of American Art
December 18, 2020–March 15, 2021
Asheville Art Museum, North Carolina
www.ashevilleart.org
Vantage Points features a selection of photographic works from the 1970s to the mid-2000s that highlights how photography has been used to represent individuals, places, and narratives. Drawn exclusively from the Whitney Museum’s permanent collection, the exhibition presents work by approximately twenty artists, including Gregory Crewdson, Sally Mann, Cindy Sherman, and Andy Warhol.
Sally Mann, Sorry Game, 1989 © Sally Mann
Closed
Gregory Crewdson in
Masters of Photography: The Garner Collection
November 14, 2020–March 14, 2021
San Diego Museum of Art
www.sdmart.org
This exhibition features a broad sampling from the substantial holdings of local collectors Cam and Wanda Garner. Emphasizing iconic images by photographers from the twentieth century to the present, this group of pictures—diverse in subject, style, photographic medium, and chronology—presents an occasion to reflect on photography’s role in history and society, and to consider its future trajectory. Work by Gregory Crewdson is included.
Gregory Crewdson, Dream House, 2002 © Gregory Crewdson
Press
The Photography of Gregory Crewdson — And Why Cate Blanchett Is Here for It by Britt Hennemuth
Vanity Fair
October 8, 2020
Online
PDF
Gagosian Goes Netflix? The Mega-Gallery Is Creating Original Content That Pairs Artists With Luminaries Like Malcolm Gladwell and Jeff Tweedy by Sarah Cascone
Artnet
October 5, 2020
Online
PDF
Gregory Crewdson Imagines Renewal and Redemption in Latest Art Exhibition. by Jennifer Sauer
CR Fashion Book
September 29, 2020
Online
PDF
The big picture: a quiet American apocalypse by Tim Adams
The Guardian
September 20, 2020
Online
PDF
For Gregory Crewdson, Truth Lurks in the Landscape by Arthur Lubow
New York Times
August 20, 2020
Online
PDF