Michael Grecco Explained

Michael Grecco
Birth Date:1958 5, mf=yes
Birth Place:United States
Field:Photography
Training:Boston University

Michael Grecco (born May 20, 1958) is an American photographer, film director and author.

Early life and education

Grecco was born in the Bronx and grew up near New York City.[1] He received his first camera (a Mamiya/Sekor 35mm single-lens reflex) when he was 12.[2] He attended Boston University, where he studied filmmaking and photojournalism as an undergraduate at BU's School of Communications.[3] During his time at Boston University he also studied with photography historian and photographer Carl Chiarenza.

Career

While in college, Grecco began working as a freelance photographer for the Associated Press and then later became a staff photographer at Boston Herald. He also shot the burgeoning new music scene for Boston Rock Magazine and the Boston radio station WBCN, documenting Boston's "pivotal role in launching the punk rock explosion" of the 1970s.[4] During the same time period, he began his career as a magazine photographer working for the Picture Group Agency based in Providence Rhode Island.[5] His early work appeared in magazines including Time,[6] Newsweek, Esquire, Vanity Fair, and Rolling Stone.[7]

Grecco moved to Los Angeles in the late 1980s. As a contributor to People, [8] his coverage of events such as the Golden Globes, the Emmy Awards and the Academy Awards led to his career as a celebrity portrait photographer. [9] [10] In 1993 he was asked to photograph a special edition of Businessweek called the "Entrepreneurs That Matter", traveling the world photographing the most important entrepreneurs of the day. That lead to being asked by Fox Broadcasting to shoot a new show, The X-Files, where he helped define the look of the show by "cross processing" color negative film in color slide chemistry and using special camera filters. In 2015 he created the first Cinemagraph to ever be used as a broadcast television spot for Pizza Hut, during the Turner Broadcasting show, Billy on the Street.[11]

His subjects have included Martin Scorsese,[12] Robert Duvall, Johnny Cash, Will Ferrell, Kanye West,[13] Mel Brooks, Ben Stiller, Penélope Cruz, Jet Li, Bill Murray, Joaquin Phoenix and Gwen Stefani.[14] He has shot covers for Time, Wired, Entertainment Weekly, ESPN, and People, among other publications.[15]

Grecco's first two books were on lighting techniques in photographic portraiture. In 2007, he released , a collection of photographs on the American porn industry and its stars taken at the AVN Awards and Convention in Las Vegas.[16] He also directed a documentary of the same name that premiered in April 2009.[17] In 2020, a collection of Grecco's photos, Punk, Post Punk, New Wave: Onstage, Backstage, In Your Face, 1978-1991, was published by Abrams Books. A "photographic document of a critical pocket of the American punk scene in all its brash and seedy glory," [18] the photos from the book were first exhibited at Photo London in 2021.[19] In early 2022, a touring exhibit of the photos, Days of Punk, premiered at La Termica Museum in Malaga, Spain. Days of Punk was subsequently exhibited in England and at the Southeast Museum of Photography.

Awards and recognition

In 1995 Photo District News named Grecco in their “Lighting Master” series. Grecco has received 5 Awards of Excellence from Communication Arts Magazine and in June 2001 was named a Hasselblad Master.[20] He also received several awards in the 2011 Prix de la Photographie Paris competition including ones for his portraits of Steve Martin and Martin Scorsese and in 2012 was one of the eight recipients of the Professional Photographer Leadership Award from the United Nations International Photographic Council.[21] [22] As a staff photographer for the Boston Herald, he won several Boston Press Photographers awards.[23]

Bibliography

Personal life

Grecco is based in Los Angeles. He has three children. He and his wife, Elizabeth Waterman, a photographer [24] and the CEO of Black + Gold, a marketing agency, were married in 2018.[25]

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Youngman. Dale. 2020-11-10 . Artist Profile: Michael Grecco . 2022-12-29 . Art and Cake . en-US.
  2. Grecco, Michael (January 2007). "Lighting and the Dramatic Portrait". The Digital Journalist. Retrieved March 27, 2014.
  3. Web site: Photographer Michael Grecco (COM'81) Caught 70s Punk and New Wave at Its Crest . 2022-12-28 . Boston University . en.
  4. Web site: 2021-01-16 . Book by ex-Hub photographer offers portrait of Boston's punk heyday . 2022-12-29 . Boston Herald . en-US.
  5. Beggy Carol and Shaahan, Mark (December 12, 2006). "Grecco shooting for the stars". Boston Globe.
  6. Joel Stein, "He's With Him", Time, 2004
  7. Photos, "Donna Summer Through the Years", Rolling Stone, 2012
  8. Web site: Brauer . Laura . 2010-04-01 . On the Cover: Michael Grecco . 2022-12-29 . Rangefinder . en.
  9. https://books.google.com/books?id=zaGiQlAb0aMC&pg=PA19 American Photo
  10. Steel, Andy (2009). The World's Top Photographer's Workshops: Celebrity & Performance, pp. 103–108. MBI Publishing. .
  11. Web site: Beer . Jeff . 2015-12-22 . Cinemagraphs Hit TV With This New Pizza Hut Commercial . 2023-01-09 . FastCompany.
  12. Richard Schickel, "Martin Scorsese", The 2007 Time 100, 2007
  13. http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1599705,00.html "Will Ferrell: Brilliant Idiot"
  14. Web site: 2021-09-05 . A lust for life … my years backstage with the giants of punk . 2022-12-29 . the Guardian . en.
  15. Miller, Alice B. (January 2007), "Open Book: Like his new best-seller, Michael Grecco is a creative amalgam of the intuitive and the technical.". Studio Photography, Vol 10, No. 1. 1097-1181.
  16. Blue, Violet (November 15, 2007). "One photographer's 'Naked Ambition'". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved March 28, 2014.
  17. Barker, Andrew (May 1, 2009). "Review: Naked Ambition: An R Rated Look at an X Rated Industry". Variety.
  18. Book: PUNK, POST PUNK, NEW WAVE . Kirkus Reviews . en.
  19. Web site: Days of Punk : Exhibition of Photography by Michael Grecco : Gallery PHOTIQ . 2022-12-30 . Photiq . en-US.
  20. Fiedler, Kerstin (June 2001). Hasselblad Masters: Michael Grecco . Hasselblad.com. Retrieved March 27, 2014.
  21. Prix de la Photographie Paris (2011) Exhibition Winners and Honorable Mentions. Retrieved March 27, 2014.
  22. International Photographic Council (March 28, 2012). "IPC Announces Leadership Awards". Retrieved March 27, 2014.
  23. Santoro, Henry (May 18, 2010), "Peep show: Michael Grecco's Naked Ambition". The Boston Phoenix. Retrieved March 27, 2014.
  24. Web site: Dambrot . Shana Nys . 2021-07-19 . Meet Photographer Elizabeth Waterman . 2022-12-29 . LA Weekly . en-US.
  25. Web site: Meet Michael Grecco: Photographer, director, producer, and entrepreneur » Days of Punk . 2021-04-25 . Days of Punk . en-US.