Venice, CA – On Tuesday, February 21, The G2 Gallery will present
Nature LA: Jeff Crandell featuring a collection of work entitled “Seascapes.” An opening reception with the artist in attendance will take place on Saturday, March 10, from 6:30–9:00 pm.
Seascapes is a part of a larger group of work,
Elements, in which Jeff explores the use of his camera as a palate for his impressionistic landscape photography. In a project that began in the crawl of a daily commute on the 405 freeway in Los Angeles, Jeff began experimenting with movement, slower shutter speeds, and the low light of evening rush hour. These combined factors reduced the natural forms to their basic elements, blurring the details to foreground shape. As he does in his work as a film and television location scout, Jeff sees in these images a scene broken down into its basic iconic images. He states, “when you look at something, what element defines the scene right off the bat?” Reduced to their basic elements, the resulting images are more emotion driven than subject driven.
Before coming to Los Angeles, Jeff’s photographic style drew from his background in photojournalism, the vibrant street life of his home base in New York, and influential artists like Garry Winograd and Diane Arbus. Frustrated with the lack of street life in Los Angeles, Jeff transposed life on the street to life in the woods. “I found characters in trees and waves in the same way that I found characters in the street.” For 5 years Jeff has been forging his new painterly style, with its flat, two-dimensional scenes of nature sketching out the elements most crucial to the scene.
With his images, Jeff hopes that his images will raise awareness among Angelenos about the diversity of the Southern California landscape. “Before we can really protect nature properly, we have to know it,” he says. The G2 Gallery will donate 100% of the proceeds from art sales during
Nature LA: Jeff Crandell to the Sierra Club.
An opening reception will be held March 10, 2012, from 6:30–9:00 pm. The reception will be part of an evening celebrating The G2 Gallery’s 4 year anniversary as well as the opening of
Ansel Adams: Open to the Public, G2’s first full-scale exhibition of work by Adams. RSVP is required to
rsvp@theg2gallery.com and a $5 admission at the door will benefit the Sierra Club.
About Jeff Crandell
As an artist, Jeff Crandell is deeply influenced by his career as a Los Angeles-based film and television location scout in the production of his photography. As intent on creating a sense of place in his images as he is on the screen, Jeff uses long exposures and motion to create meaning in his exquisitely abstracted LA landscapes. Originally from Bronxville, New York, Jeff's initial contact with photography was through his father, an employee of
Life magazine, and by grade 7 he was learning how to print black and white photography. After completing his studies in Communications and Photojournalism at American University, Jeff began working on low budget feature films while documenting street life in the colorful hotbed of 1980s New York City. Jeff relocated to Los Angeles in the early 90s, and frustrated with a perceived lack of street life, turned away from documentary style photography in favor of a more experimental photographic style. Jeff’s television career highlights include three Emmy award-winning seasons as the location manager for
The West Wing. Over the past decade, Jeff has participated in various exhibitions including group exhibits at the Pacific Design Center and Beady Minces Gallery, and a solo show at the Rose Cafe in Venice. He continues to work in television.
