What makes a body a body, and how is it constrained by normative expectations? Photographer Matthieu Croizier asks himself these questions and attempts to answer them when he captures images of himself and those around him. Combining the ideas of monstrosity and queerness, the artist portrays what it means to be weird, different or even abnormal, down to the anatomic level. He fully embraces obscureness. Drawn to other art that he describes as at least a little bit weird, Croizier also always tries to add a ‘strange’ element to his own work.
In his series, Everything Goes Dark a Little Further Down, recently published as a photo book by Mörel, Croizier finds beauty where it may be least expected. The title and the idea it encapsulates is based on a 2020 article in The Atlantic that recounts an underwater discovery of life in the ocean trenches. Croizier uses this unearthing as a metaphor to embrace beauty in dark places. Expanding on this idea, the photographer says that “if you dig into the norm, well, you may find yourself facing a bunch of monstrosity.” This underwater discovery was an abnormal development in a seemingly normal part of the subaquatic darkness.
Some other unique elements of the photographer’s work include his relationship with his queer identity and reclaiming words like ‘queer’ and ‘faggot,’ turning their historically negative connotation on their heads. “We hold on to binary ideas, actively distinguishing between what is beautiful and ugly, normal or weird. I wanted to blur the line between those ideas, to show that monstrosity exists within us all and that it is a concept that has been shaped and constructed over time.”
Hi Matthieu, it’s a pleasure to speak with you. To get to know you better, what does a ‘normal’ day in your life look like?
Hi Rose, nice to meet you! Mmh, it’s a bit hard to say because I don’t really have a routine and my day really depends on what I’m working on. But if I think of the days I’m not shooting and I work from home, it would be getting up around eight, grabbing a coffee, taking my dog for a walk and then start working around nine. I tend to get lost in work and lose track of time, and then suddenly it’s already the end of the day. I could also say that being late is the closest I have to a routine.
You’ve spoken about normality. Of your latest series, Everything Goes Dark A Little Further Down, you’ve said: “To me, this work is a celebration of the renunciation of being normal.” So, what does being normal mean, look like, or feel like? And why renounce it?
When I was younger, I had this very strong fear of not being like everybody else. I just wanted to be normal. To fit in, have a girlfriend, enjoy football, but stop looking at the other boys in the changing rooms. To be normal, I had to be a regular dude. And I tried for a while, even if it didn’t really work, I tried. I even was homophobic for a while. You know, classic closeted gay teenager stuff I guess, just trying to adapt to survive in the group.
Normality is something a society creates in opposition to what is not considered normal. It is a structure of rules that creates a lot of complex, self-hate, and violence. It took me a long time to accept myself as I am, and I think it had a lot to do with the reappropriation of the word ‘pédé’ (faggot in French) as a form of resistance. Once I understood that I could take something so negative and harmful and turn it into something strong and beautiful, everything just went so much smoother.
Normality is something a society creates in opposition to what is not considered normal. It is a structure of rules that creates a lot of complex, self-hate, and violence. It took me a long time to accept myself as I am, and I think it had a lot to do with the reappropriation of the word ‘pédé’ (faggot in French) as a form of resistance. Once I understood that I could take something so negative and harmful and turn it into something strong and beautiful, everything just went so much smoother.
You brought the series to a photo book, published this past January through Mörel. Can you start by explaining the main inspiration for this photo collection?
When I started to work on this project, in the last year of my Bachelor at ECAL (University of Art and Design Lausanne), I was interested in the concept of monstrosity as the anti-norm. I began to examine the construction of monstrosity throughout history, from Giovanni Battista de Cavalieri’s monsters, the invention of hysteria in the 19th century, the role of freak shows, and right up to horror movies. Staging was essential, and images were manipulated to play a vital role in reinforcing the norm.
On the other hand, I also dug into scientific, medical, and anatomical iconographies, which are very strict and normative, and I tried to deconstruct those representations of the body. I began thinking about to what extent is a body a body? And how can it free itself from the norms that constrain it? We hold on to binary ideas, actively distinguishing between what is beautiful and ugly, normal or weird. I wanted to blur the line between those ideas, to show that monstrosity exists within us all, and that it is a concept that has been shaped and constructed over time.
Through self-representation, using my body as a raw material, I tried to fabricate monstrosity out of simple things surrounding me, to embrace it rather than to reject it. The photographs depict some sort of metamorphosis, where fragments are melded together to create something new.
On the other hand, I also dug into scientific, medical, and anatomical iconographies, which are very strict and normative, and I tried to deconstruct those representations of the body. I began thinking about to what extent is a body a body? And how can it free itself from the norms that constrain it? We hold on to binary ideas, actively distinguishing between what is beautiful and ugly, normal or weird. I wanted to blur the line between those ideas, to show that monstrosity exists within us all, and that it is a concept that has been shaped and constructed over time.
Through self-representation, using my body as a raw material, I tried to fabricate monstrosity out of simple things surrounding me, to embrace it rather than to reject it. The photographs depict some sort of metamorphosis, where fragments are melded together to create something new.
An explanation for Everything Goes Dark A Little Further Down mentions that one of your main points of inspiration was David Lynch’s Eraserhead. Why this movie?
Indeed, Eraserhead is one of my favorite movies. It is just so weirdly beautiful. I had never seen anything like it. I’ve asked Joanna L. Cresswell to write a text for the book. We had been talking a lot about this movie, since some images are even direct references to it, and here is what she wrote —-I’ll just quote here since I could not explain it better:
“Hi Reader,
Do you remember that scene from Eraserhead, where the protagonist Henry finds out he has a baby? You know the one, you must do—his girlfriend’s mum tells him after a chicken dinner gone awry. Goggle-eyed and frazzled Henry gawks at the news, and all the while his girlfriend grimaces and wails, telling him that the hospital isn’t sure it even is a baby yet. Can you imagine? What a delicious riot that line is. The whole narrative could be reduced to it, if you think about it. Anyway, it got me thinking how all the best stories begin with the invocation of a monster.
I recall this scene mostly because it has me thinking about bodies, what’s expected of them, how they house us, their edges, their parts, and how fearful we are when they deviate from what’s normal. But what’s normal? What makes a body a body? Surely what we call natural is only what we’ve naturalised. In Eraserhead, whatever body had emerged from Henry’s lover was grotesque; something other than human. Other than.”
Do you remember that scene from Eraserhead, where the protagonist Henry finds out he has a baby? You know the one, you must do—his girlfriend’s mum tells him after a chicken dinner gone awry. Goggle-eyed and frazzled Henry gawks at the news, and all the while his girlfriend grimaces and wails, telling him that the hospital isn’t sure it even is a baby yet. Can you imagine? What a delicious riot that line is. The whole narrative could be reduced to it, if you think about it. Anyway, it got me thinking how all the best stories begin with the invocation of a monster.
I recall this scene mostly because it has me thinking about bodies, what’s expected of them, how they house us, their edges, their parts, and how fearful we are when they deviate from what’s normal. But what’s normal? What makes a body a body? Surely what we call natural is only what we’ve naturalised. In Eraserhead, whatever body had emerged from Henry’s lover was grotesque; something other than human. Other than.”
What other art modalities or artists inspire you on a daily basis?
I am very inspired by cinema, as well as painting, which are two mediums very close to photography. If I have to list some artists, I would think of Louis Fratino, Vojtěch Kovařík, Julia Ducournau, Wolfgang Tillmans, Mark McKnight, Jack Davison. I‘ve also just discovered Momo Okabe’s work in Les Rencontres d’Arles this year and I am obsessed with her book Ilmatar.
Can you tell me a bit about your background? You graduated in 2017 with a bachelors in photography from the Photography School of Vevey. Was photography always a career you wanted to pursue?
I also graduated from the Bachelor at ECAL in 2020. Pretty much, yes, since I was around fifteen. But my parents made it very clear that photography was a very nice hobby, but definitely not a job. So, I tried to do what they were expecting me to. I went to the University in Lausanne, first in Forensic Sciences (I guess I’d watched too many TV shows), which I screwed up beautifully, and then in Biology. This time I didn’t wait for the exams to drop out, and I applied to the Photography School of Vevey, as I realised I was no good at anything else.
With over six months since your book was released, how has it been received by the audience?
To be honest, it is a bit hard to say. I’ve only heard the good reviews, but maybe some people hated it and were just too polite to say. Last week in Arles, Andrea from Tipi Bookshop just told me after selling a few copies that people didn’t really get what was happening but it was not important to them: it felt like a weird sci-fi movie and they enjoyed it.
What was the process like of creating a photo book? What were some of your greatest challenges and rewards in making this project?
Making the book was a very long process. We spent three years on it with Aron (Mörel). We didn’t work on it all the time. We also had long breaks, sometimes not looking at it for six months. It was at times a bit frustrating, but I think I needed this time so that things could arrange themselves correctly.
I love photography books so much, so this was a real dream coming true to make one, and I sometimes got too excited, having too much contradictory ideas, going too far into one direction, and then too far in the other. But, in the end, I think (or I hope), that we’ve found a good balance. What I enjoyed the most was working on the sequence, getting in some sort of trance, listening to music and editing for hours at night, drowning completely in the book like nothing else mattered anymore.
I love photography books so much, so this was a real dream coming true to make one, and I sometimes got too excited, having too much contradictory ideas, going too far into one direction, and then too far in the other. But, in the end, I think (or I hope), that we’ve found a good balance. What I enjoyed the most was working on the sequence, getting in some sort of trance, listening to music and editing for hours at night, drowning completely in the book like nothing else mattered anymore.
Did you take these photographs with the intention of turning them into a combined piece? Or did the final project occur after these photographs were taken?
I soon had the intention of making a book with all the images. I didn’t want to show only a few images, but rather have a lot of different ones to have something very dense and a little bit shapeless.
Compared to your previous project, The Darkness is for Living Together, where you capture portraits of other people, in Everything Goes Dark A Little Further Down, you utilise self-portraiture, mostly of your body parts like your hands and head. How has exposing yourself in your photographs changed the way you relate to your work? With yourself as the subject matter, is this project more intimate or personal than previous ones?
Indeed, The Darkness is For Living Together is less personal as it was conceived as an editorial shoot in collaboration with the artist and friend of mine David Weishaar. I took inspiration from his paintings to create my photographs –some images are even direct reference to his work– and he then digitally painted some details on them.
In Everything Goes Dark A Little Further Down, I started to work with self-portraiture for the first time. I decided to use my own body as a raw material as I wanted to claim my own monstrosity, in a similar way as reappropriating the stigmatising terms as ‘faggot’ or ‘queer.’ I was working alone in my apartment and I was completely free to explore my body. It felt great to turn the camera on myself — liberating, even — and I didn’t really expect it, but I loved it.
In Everything Goes Dark A Little Further Down, I started to work with self-portraiture for the first time. I decided to use my own body as a raw material as I wanted to claim my own monstrosity, in a similar way as reappropriating the stigmatising terms as ‘faggot’ or ‘queer.’ I was working alone in my apartment and I was completely free to explore my body. It felt great to turn the camera on myself — liberating, even — and I didn’t really expect it, but I loved it.
Both your previous project, The Darkness is for Living Together, and the recent photo series, Everything Goes Dark A Little Further Down, include the word “dark” in the title. What does this darkness that you are referring to mean to you?
You’re right, I am quite fascinated by the idea of the darkness. Just like in photography, light is nothing without shadows, and everything you can’t see is where you can let your imagination run free. Beauty can be found in unexpected places, and perhaps the darkness is a good place to start looking for it.
Both titles actually come from quotes. The Darkness is for Living Together comes from the book The Faggots & Their Friends Between Revolutions, an exploration of the experience of queer community life in the 1970s, written by Larry Mitchell in 1977. And the title Everything Goes Dark a Little Further Down comes from Wil S. Hylton’s article, History’s Largest Mining Operation Is About to Begin, published in The Atlantic, in the January-February 2020 issue:
“The traditional model of life on Earth relies on photosynthesis: plants on land and in shallow water harness sunlight to grow biomass, which is devoured by creatures small and large, up the food chain to Sunday dinner. By this account, every animal on the planet would depend on plants to capture solar energy. Since plants disappear a few hundred feet below sea level, and everything goes dark a little farther down, there was no reason to expect a thriving ecosystem in the deep. Maybe a light snow of organic debris would trickle from the surface, but it would be enough to sustain only a few wayward aquatic drifters.
That theory capsized in 1977, when a pair of oceanographers began poking around the Pacific in a submersible vehicle. While exploring a range of underwater mountains near the Galápagos Islands, they spotted a hydrothermal vent about 8,000 feet deep. No one had ever seen an underwater hot spring before, though geologists suspected they might exist. As the oceanographers drew close to the vent, they made an even more startling discovery: A large congregation of animals was camped around the vent opening. These were not the feeble scavengers that one expected so far down. They were giant clams, purple octopuses, white crabs, and 10-foot tube worms, whose food chain began not with plants but with organic chemicals floating in the warm vent water.
For biologists, this was more than curious. It shook the foundation of their field. If a complex ecosystem could emerge in a landscape devoid of plants, evolution must be more than a heliological affair. Life could appear in perfect darkness, in blistering heat and a broth of noxious compounds — an environment that would extinguish every known creature on Earth.”
I fell in love with this idea, reading it as a metaphor that if you dig deep enough into the darkness, you’ll end up finding beauty where you did not expect to. And if you dig into the norm, well, you may find yourself facing a bunch of monstrosity.
Both titles actually come from quotes. The Darkness is for Living Together comes from the book The Faggots & Their Friends Between Revolutions, an exploration of the experience of queer community life in the 1970s, written by Larry Mitchell in 1977. And the title Everything Goes Dark a Little Further Down comes from Wil S. Hylton’s article, History’s Largest Mining Operation Is About to Begin, published in The Atlantic, in the January-February 2020 issue:
“The traditional model of life on Earth relies on photosynthesis: plants on land and in shallow water harness sunlight to grow biomass, which is devoured by creatures small and large, up the food chain to Sunday dinner. By this account, every animal on the planet would depend on plants to capture solar energy. Since plants disappear a few hundred feet below sea level, and everything goes dark a little farther down, there was no reason to expect a thriving ecosystem in the deep. Maybe a light snow of organic debris would trickle from the surface, but it would be enough to sustain only a few wayward aquatic drifters.
That theory capsized in 1977, when a pair of oceanographers began poking around the Pacific in a submersible vehicle. While exploring a range of underwater mountains near the Galápagos Islands, they spotted a hydrothermal vent about 8,000 feet deep. No one had ever seen an underwater hot spring before, though geologists suspected they might exist. As the oceanographers drew close to the vent, they made an even more startling discovery: A large congregation of animals was camped around the vent opening. These were not the feeble scavengers that one expected so far down. They were giant clams, purple octopuses, white crabs, and 10-foot tube worms, whose food chain began not with plants but with organic chemicals floating in the warm vent water.
For biologists, this was more than curious. It shook the foundation of their field. If a complex ecosystem could emerge in a landscape devoid of plants, evolution must be more than a heliological affair. Life could appear in perfect darkness, in blistering heat and a broth of noxious compounds — an environment that would extinguish every known creature on Earth.”
I fell in love with this idea, reading it as a metaphor that if you dig deep enough into the darkness, you’ll end up finding beauty where you did not expect to. And if you dig into the norm, well, you may find yourself facing a bunch of monstrosity.
With these titles in mind, does your photography tend to be a mode of expression for the more pessimistic aspects of life? Do you ever use your art to express the lighter or brighter side of life?
I don’t really see it that way. To me the darkness is not not something negative, but rather something mysterious and beautiful. The darkness is where you can be yourself, where you meet with your friends to plan revolutions or simply be free of the gaze of others. Whether it's in a sticky-floored bar, an after-party in a car park, a long damp corridor in a sauna where you have to make your way through sweaty bodies, or a dark room.
But I am also completely obsessed by the sun. It is almost like an addiction. I need to feel the heat gently burning my skin. One of my favorite things in the world is just watching the sunset. This magical moment, in between, when everything seems to be on hold. So, of course, I do photograph a lot of more lighter or brighter sides of life, like flowers, sunsets, people kissing, and pink flamingos.
But I am also completely obsessed by the sun. It is almost like an addiction. I need to feel the heat gently burning my skin. One of my favorite things in the world is just watching the sunset. This magical moment, in between, when everything seems to be on hold. So, of course, I do photograph a lot of more lighter or brighter sides of life, like flowers, sunsets, people kissing, and pink flamingos.
Your website states that you incorporate your queer identity into your work. For your previous project, your title relates to the experience of queer community life, and for Everything Goes Dark A Little Further Down, you use the idea of monstrosity in relation to your own queerness. Can you elaborate on this latter concept? How do you blend monstrosity and queer identity?
Well, the word queer originally means strange. It then became an insult used to describe anyone who does not conform to the norms of gender and sexuality, and it was eventually reappropriated by the LGBTQIA+ community. Queer is everything that is not normal, which is also the definition I would use to describe the monstrosity. I think that all monsters are queers. Here is another passage of the text written by Joanna that also answers this question very well, I believe:
“Monsters have existed for as long as we have, you see – inside of us, and in our visions of each other. Vampires and aberrations, split personalities and metamorphoses, think of the endless characters who have oscillated at the peripheries of societies, in sunless realms, shunned from the mainstream, but then think too of the morals that have been inscribed into their tales. Where did these lessons come from? What fears do they quell? Monstrousness has always been an emblem of queerness, transformation, and unearthing true selves.”
“Monsters have existed for as long as we have, you see – inside of us, and in our visions of each other. Vampires and aberrations, split personalities and metamorphoses, think of the endless characters who have oscillated at the peripheries of societies, in sunless realms, shunned from the mainstream, but then think too of the morals that have been inscribed into their tales. Where did these lessons come from? What fears do they quell? Monstrousness has always been an emblem of queerness, transformation, and unearthing true selves.”
In general, how does your queerness play a role in your work, and do you have any specific visions for future work in relation to it?
I think it plays a very central part in it since it’s part of who I am. It isn’t all of it of course, but I am always interested in things that might be seen as weird and I always try to add a sort of strangeness in my images. I think that I truly like an image only when it feels a bit weird (or a lot). When it is not exactly what you are used to seeing.
Queerness is always something that’s gonna be present in my work since the reappropriation of certain stigmatising terms such as freak, queer or faggot is what inspires and feeds my work, through which I decide to reclaim my own monstrosity. What is beautiful, what is ugly? For me, beauty is queer. It's something we can't pin down, something magical in constant mutation. It is bizarre, fabulous, confusing, sexy and ugly.
Queerness is always something that’s gonna be present in my work since the reappropriation of certain stigmatising terms such as freak, queer or faggot is what inspires and feeds my work, through which I decide to reclaim my own monstrosity. What is beautiful, what is ugly? For me, beauty is queer. It's something we can't pin down, something magical in constant mutation. It is bizarre, fabulous, confusing, sexy and ugly.
In most of your photographs, the content seems staged, almost as if you are trying to tell a very specific story through the lens. Can you elaborate on what your pre-production process is like? Do you incorporate improvisation into your photoshoots?
I do stage my images, but I also leave a lot of space for improvisation. I usually only plan a little what I want to do. I have a first vague direction of what feeling or idea I want to create, and then I leave the moment to do the rest. A lot of my images even actually are accidents,and were not really planned, or not as they turned out. I had another idea that evolved on the moment and created images I never thought of.
Since I use an analogue camera, I can’t see what I’m doing or how it’s gonna look, and that really changes everything because there is a lot more freedom in being able to let go of self-control in that way. I put my camera on the tripod and I set the frame, which becomes a space of freedom and experimentation to perform who I want to be in this particular moment.
Since I use an analogue camera, I can’t see what I’m doing or how it’s gonna look, and that really changes everything because there is a lot more freedom in being able to let go of self-control in that way. I put my camera on the tripod and I set the frame, which becomes a space of freedom and experimentation to perform who I want to be in this particular moment.
Do you have a favorite subject matter that you prefer to take photos of? What about this subject is so striking to you?
I love to photograph people. Everyone is so different and unique. That’s what I really love about photography. The camera becomes an excuse to meet people I would maybe never have met otherwise. I’m quite a shy person, and the camera gives me an accessible way to connect with people. I also love to keep on photographing some of my close friends or family over the years. So yes, definitely people are my favorite subjects, faces being absolutely fascinating as well as bodies. Oh, and I also love to photograph dogs and flowers too!
What kind of camera do you tend to photograph with? And what is your print process like? What sort of technology or software do you use to make your final projects dynamic?
The Mamiya 645 is my favourite camera by far. I take it everywhere with me, from commissions to holidays and family reunions. I also use the Mamiya RZ or a 135mm camera, as well as a Nikon D850 for the digital, which I have to use a lot for commission, when the timing is too tight or if we need a lot of images. When I shoot analogue, I then scan the negatives in my studio and edit the images with Flexcolor first and then with Photoshop. I also mix techniques and sometimes print my images, rephotograph or scan them. I always try to experiment a little in all steps of the process.
How did going to school shape your artwork today? In what ways did it change you from the person you were, artistically speaking, when you started?
I guess it’s changed me quite a lot, but in a good way. I think it helps me get in the direction I’m interested in a lot quicker than I would have otherwise. I have met so many amazing people there and have learned a lot from them. For that, I’m very grateful!
Do you have any projects you are currently working on? Would you do another photo book, or do you have a different way that you wish to display your images in the future?
I have been working on a few other projects, yes. Since I do a lot of commission work, it’s not always easy to find the time to keep working on personal projects, and that’s the most frustrating I think. But I try to make some space for it. Since I feel like I just got out of the book process, I’m not thinking of making another project in a book form for now, but that might very well change (I’m actually almost changing my mind while saying this). I also love to work with prints and installation in a specific space. I will be showing another project, That Moment When You Can See The Crack In The World, for my first solo show outside of Switzerland at the PhMuseum Lab in Bologna, in January 2025.
