Gregory Crewdson

Gregory Crewdson, Untitled (Ophelia), 2001. (C) Gregory Crewdson.

I don't like this picture. I don't like Crewdson's work generally. I don't even like the work of his followers, much. But I haven't quite known why.

Maybe there is something about photography as an art form that is inimical to certain kinds of contrivance. For example, continuing to speak personally, I like Millais' Ophelia, and yet it could hardly be more contrived. But we expect painters to contrive.

John Everett Millais, Ophelia, 1852

At the same time, I don't object to all contrivance in photography. I like Cindy Sherman, for example. Although her work is obviously staged, that's the point, and there's nothing pretentious about it. I like Jeff Wall. His pictures are contrived, but, again, without pretense and to an end that is essentially visual. I like the conceptual but straightforward work of Bernd and Hilla Becher. I even like Uta Barth.

What, then, is my problem with Crewdson?


Robert Frank, U.S. 66, 1955. (C) Robert Frank

My problem - the problem - with Crewdson is that his pictures have no truth in them. Not only do they refer to nothing real in the world, they contain no truth of their own. There is nothing in them that causes us to say "yes, that's how it is." On any level. And what is art if not an objective referent of felt life?

Robert Frank, in contrast, did both. His pictures described an America that really existed, somewhere, out there, and also told us how it felt, how it still feels, to live there. I don't know if there is less truth in America now than there was in 1955, but I think it's a good bet. That's another reason why Frank looks so strong today, and Crewdson so shallow. We're just dying for someone to tell us the truth.