Soul Stealer

Commercial photographer Tyson Crosbie says he "steals souls for a living." If that’s true, his latest gallery exhibition, “The Phoenix Series,” is his surreptitious attempt to seize the soulful essence of our fair city. With a camera lens closely aimed at decaying strips of vivid paint swashes as well as...

By Leslie Barton

August 5, 2010

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Commercial photographer Tyson Crosbie says he "steals souls for a living." If that’s true, his latest gallery exhibition, “The Phoenix Series,” is his surreptitious attempt to seize the soulful essence of our fair city.

With a camera lens closely aimed at decaying strips of vivid paint swashes as well as dusky colors stabbing through broken asphalt, metal, and shadows, the end result – printed on high-gloss archival paper – is as candidly textured as any oil painting inspired by Pollock or Rothko. Crosbie, in spite of his mechanical medium, forces us into his skewed micro-realism and we're unable to surmise the original subject. Plus, he's able to utilize Phoenix's gritty, urban cityscape to pursue an emotion perhaps not originally available to either himself or the viewer.

Aug. 7-31, 2010

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