Ralph Eugene Meatyard lived in Lexington where he worked as an optician. meanwhile he created an impressive collection of photographs. Meatyard’s creative circle included mystics and poets, such as Thomas Merton and Guy Davenport also the photographers Cranston Ritchie and Van Deren Coke. Meatyard worked across many genres and experimented with new means of expression, from dreamlike portraits—often set in abandoned places—to multiple exposures, motion-blur, and other methods of photographic abstraction.
Museum exhibitions of the artist’s work have recently been presented at The Art Institute of Chicago
I personally really love his work for it is mysterious and eeary. Some of his work is quite fearsome, for example, his doll masks. He would take an image of a person, usually in a woody setting, and attach doll faces to their heads. I belive this is exiting and spine chilling for the audience. I believe that the fact his images are monochromatic also gives in a ghostly feel. When he plays with focus he produces really interesting, abstract images that leave the audience confused as to what it is off of what will happen next. Most of his images tell a story and almost end on a cliff hanger.
I picked out images linking to the formal element focus.