Nigel Tomm is a photographer and visual artist who’s unique approach to human distortion photography (affectionately known as “Crumpletography”) has earned him world-wide recognition. His works use a simple method of printing and then crumpling up a photograph to achieve a thought-provoking piece.
Artist Examples
Artist Analysis
Nigel Tomm creates images which feature various subjects distorted though a method he has dubbed ‘Crumpletography’. His images are typically cuttings from magazines and other publications. The original images are realistic as they are photographs taken of models, however once they have been crumpled, they appear distorted.
The works have a simple composition: The subject is in the centre and is often placed against a dark or black background. This sharp contrast helps draw your attention to the subject and serves to highlight the crumples in the paper. These crumples create a very interesting texture which plays a key role in the distortion of the image.
His process is very simple. He cuts the images out of magazines and then crumples them in ways that distort the human figure, for example, he might crumple a line over the mouth to distort that feature. Images of the crumpled photograph are then taken with dramatic lighting to further highlight the contours of the crumples
The images are very atmospheric, due in part to the dramatic contrast between the black background and the highlighted contours. They are also very striking and were created with the intention to show how even the epitome of beauty and fashion is distorted in some way.
Artist Experiments
