Bruce Cratsley

Book excerpt: For over twenty years, Bruce Cratsley has been producing intimate, mysterious, and engrossing photographs. The dominant theme of his work -- whether in haunting street scenes of Paris and New York, in portraits of friends and lovers, or in images of ordinary objects -- has been the interplay of light and shadow. While one sees traces in Cratsley's images of Atget, of Kertesz, and of his mentor and friend, Lisette Model, it is finally the artist's unmistakably unique vision which stands him apart. This definitive monograph encompasses the period 1976 to 1996, and illustrates how the photographer's personal battle with the AIDS virus has infused his work with startling sharpness and immediacy. At their best, Cratsley's pieces offer both vivid testimony of life's potential, and somber meditation on its fragility. Bruce Cratsley (b. 1944) has been a participant in the New York art world for four decades: as a curator, gallerist, photo editor of the Village Voice, and a Guggenheim Fellow in photography from 1989 to 1990. In the early seventies, he befriended Peter Hujar, who encouraged him to pursue art, and later studied with Lisette Model at the New School for Social Research.