Michael Grecco is an intense guy. Physically he looks like a cross between a good-looking Tony Soprano and Sylvester Stallone. Either way, he’s not someone you want to mess with. He exudes confidence and a high testosterone sensuality (which may explain his latest project, but we’ll get to that later).  As a celebrity photographer he is best known for his moody black and white portraits, often elaborately staged and lit to perfection.  He says he’s more interested in “creating images than capturing moments,” and with his photography he looks to uncover something about a person that we haven’t seen before – not easy when you are working with some of the most familiar faces on the planet. Michael moves easily in this world of fame, fortune and glamour. He fits, and sitting in his office in Santa Monica it is easy to see why.

The office, a detached building behind his home, is surrounded by a very Zen-like garden. Cushion-covered benches flank the front door, and inside, a relaxed (he’s just come from yoga) Grecco is dressed casually in black, surrounded by what looks like organized chaos. Floor to ceiling bookshelves line one wall. A large monitor, and piles of papers, files, books and contracts share space on a u-shaped desk in the middle of the room – a sort of command center  – while an assistant, a striking young woman who is L.A. thin, platinum blonde, and dressed for the runway even though it’s Saturday, works quietly at a computer off to the side.  The scene is so L.A. – and Grecco is clearly comfortable, even if it is a long way from where he started.

Born in New York City and raised in Westchester County just to the north, Michael got his first taste of photography at summer camp in upstate New York when he was just 12-years-old. He begged his parents for a camera of his own, and after a lot of pleading, Mom and Dad gave in, buying Michael a 35mm camera with interchangeable lenses. He hasn’t stopped shooting since. After high school he enrolled in Boston University where he got hooked on photojournalism, and after graduation, he got a job as a stringer with the Associated Press, and eventually landed what he thought, at the time, was his “dream job” with the Boston Herald. He shot the Super Bowl, the World Series, Hurricane Gloria, violent protests and many politicians from governors to presidents. He learned to shoot first and fast, but eventually realized his heart just wasn’t in it. “I gravitated to it because it was exciting, not from the artistic side, but from the lifestyle side. I did that for years, and then I woke up one day and said, ‘What the hell am I doing?’” He remembers the day that he knew he was done. “I was covering an anti-Klan demonstration in Connecticut and bullets started flying. I hit the ground. Two very famous photojournalists who were there too, got up and started shooting with cameras. I basically hit the ground and stayed there. I realized that day, I was in the wrong business.”

Grecco quit his job and moved to California. “I packed up a 22-foot U-Haul and attached my Volkswagen Rabbit to the back. As I drove out, I realized you can never back up  – not figuratively or literally. But at the time I think I was more worried about literally.” He admits his decision to move to L.A. may have had more to do with watching too much “‘Starsky and Hutch’ as a child” than any real analysis, but he was now committed to the land of sunshine. With no job lined up, he relied on freelance work to survive, including unit photography on film and TV sets. That turned out to be an invaluable experience because Grecco learned new lighting techniques. At first, he applied those lighting tricks to small jobs, mostly for business magazines, but he slowly built his portfolio, changed his approach and the portrait work started to come. He experimented and started to look at every shoot much like a set designer would look at a performance. Every detail was considered, and he says one shot in particular symbolizes his shift into what he calls conceptual photography.

Buzz Magazine hired Grecco to shoot writer/director Barry Yourgrau and his 1967 Dodge Dart. Yourgrau had written a funny and sarcastic piece about how his car was one of the coolest in Los Angeles. Michael knew he had to integrate writer and car, but how? He photographed Barry in various poses around the car before he hit on the idea – Barry as the hood ornament. Grecco knew he had something special. For the first time instead of capturing reality, he made his own, and it’s that “creating” that is at the core of every portrait he has done since.

Today Grecco works with a team: photo assistants, set builders, location scouts, hair and make-up artists, wardrobe stylists, art directors, and photo editors. He sees every shot as a collaborative effort. But still, some of his most memorable images come from the connection between photographer and subject. The legendary Jack Lemmon hired Michael to take some shots for a charity event Lemmon was involved with. There would be no elaborate set-up, and Grecco really didn’t know what he was going to do. He had been mulling over the idea of shooting famous hands, and he shared the idea with Lemmon. The actor went with it, and the result is a dramatic and poignant portrait.

As for the worst celebrity shoot, Grecco says without hesitation, “That would be Barry Manilow. He came into the room and immediately said, ‘The energy isn’t good.’ We took Polaroid after Polaroid, trying to come up with something he would like. Finally we just gave up!” Fortunately for Michael, that doesn’t happen often, but he says when working with high profile, famous people you have to be flexible because sometimes they just won’t do what you want them to do. Establishing a connection, a level of trust, is essential to getting a good photograph – that and lighting.

Grecco is meticulous about lighting and has become a recognized expert. In his first book, Lighting and the Dramatic Portrait, he shares a lot of the secrets he’s learned along the way. It’s a great book in that you get the stories behind the photographs along with the technical know-how, including diagrams of lighting set-ups. He goes into detail on his three “laws of lighting” – color, contrast, and softness. He relies on intricate pre-planning to get the dramatic results he wants – a far cry from his shoot-from-the-hip days as a newspaper photographer.

More than likely you’ve seen a Michael Grecco photograph in one magazine or another, or if you are a fan of Bravo reality TV you may have seen him on “Shear Genius” – a dozen hair stylists competing for the title. Grecco was brought in to photograph the models and act as guest judge.  He liked the experience but wasn’t crazy about the editing. The producers wanted drama so they encouraged brutal honesty and then, according to Michael, edited the footage to make him even meaner. “Really,” he says charmingly, “I wasn’t that nasty.” Grecco did the show for fun and PR, but his real focus lately has been a four-year project looking at the world of pornography and the cast of characters who choose a profession where sex is the commodity.

Grecco has always been intrigued with “subcultures.” He likes to capture the energy of the boardwalk at Venice Beach, or the “tude” of young skateboarders. His off days are often spent shooting these sometimes marginalized communities within the larger American landscape, so much so that a L.A. Times reporter once told him, “You really like the weirdos.” Recognizing that the reporter might be right, Michael decided to embrace the concept. He became intrigued with the idea of pornography after a trip to the AVN Show and Expo held in Las Vegas – a sexual sideshow that attracts 30,000 people every year. “Going to the event started the project,” he says.  ” was already conscious that I was attracted to interesting people who challenge the norm.” Grecco knew he wanted to photographically chronicle the event, but he also knew he had to be careful because he had a mainstream career to consider. He wanted to shoot the characters, not the sex. The result is a book appropriately titled Naked Ambition – an “R-rated look at an X-rated industry.”

The photos are nothing like his edgy black and white work. Shot in color against brightly colored backdrops, the photos are mostly devoid of sex. It’s almost as if Grecco shines a bright light on his subjects, and in so doing so exposes the facade.  “The pictures are not retouched,” he says. “We photographed them as they came. Some of the women were mad at me, but as a pop culture book I wanted a book about the industry that was more of a document. A blend of photojournalism and portraiture.” So he created a book with a magazine feel, photos accompanied by text – words that are more provocative than the images.

Grecco and his partners also did a full-length documentary film to compliment the book, and subsequent gallery exhibition of the photographs. He likes the three-pronged approach to projects and hopes to replicate it the next time he “drops in” on a subculture. And there will be a next time, but as a superstitious person, he won’t say what that might be. He thought about the political conventions this summer, but couldn’t get the project together fast enough.

Grecco believes he is developing two distinct bodies of work: the portraits and the subcultures. And he will continue with both, adjusting to current market trends, which for now does not include a lot of black and white magazine work. It is interesting that Grecco’s for-hire work has such a fine art feel, and his fine art has such a commercial gloss. That mix keeps it interesting and difficult to define or pigeonhole the artist. The challenge for Grecco will be to remain true to his signature style and still push the provocative envelope to keep him and his fans coming back for more.

Written by: Erin Clark

Artworks Magazine: Winer 2008