“…What’s hidden in the darkness is just as important to me
as what’s revealed in the light.”
There is something slightly disquieting about Bill Holderfield’s images. A sense of unease. They are, on the surface, ordinary scenes: a sand-fringed desert highway, a roadside motel bathed in neon light, the wood-panelled facade of a typical midwestern home.
Yet each image is permeated with tension. We feel like we’ve stepped into a story mid-frame, caught in the quiet just before the next scene unfolds. It’s this subtle sense of narrative, just beneath the surface, that gives Holderfield’s work its charge.
While researching his work, I came across an article in which Holderfield referenced a quote by the legendary American musician Tom Waits: “I like beautiful melodies telling me terrible things”, noting that it perfectly reflects his own approach to photography. It’s telling. His images are ostensibly beautiful, in the way that great photographers can transform the familiar into something visually compelling.
Yet, Holderfield doesn’t simply capture what’s in front of him; he heightens the atmosphere, stretching the stillness until it feels just slightly off-kilter. A motel sign flickers a little too faintly. A road ahead vanishes into darkness. Even in broad daylight, something feels amiss, as though something is about to unfold.
His path into photography was shaped by personal loss. He’d “flirted around the edges” of the medium for years, but it wasn’t until the death of a close friend—herself a photographer and photography history professor—that he began to pursue it seriously. Picking up the camera became both a way of coping and a way to “honor her belief in him as an artist.”
Much of his work features industrial or post-industrial settings, places close to his heart. Growing up in Cleveland, Holderfield speaks of the city with a kind of grim affection: “I remember the towering green flames from the steel mills, used car lots, power lines tangled like gigantic black cobwebs, bowling alleys, convenience stores, abandoned buildings…”
But these aren’t just aesthetic subjects; they’re imprinted in his psyche. “I understand them. I feel deeply connected to them” he says. This connection is clear in his work. The landscapes feel like elegies for a fading America. What was, and what remains. A rusting industrial heartland slipping quietly into shadow.
The sense of atmosphere in his work is heightened by his preference for shooting at night. “At night,” he says, “the world slows down. The scenes feel narratively open-ended.” The darkness acts as a kind of veil, a quiet amplifier. It cloaks and isolates. It transforms the familiar into something loaded and cinematic. He invites us not to witness, but to wonder.
“I can think and feel more clearly at night. The world reveals itself in isolated vignettes, stage pieces that tell stories without distractions.
What’s hidden in the darkness is just as important to me as what’s revealed in the light.”
Human subjects, if they appear at all, are kept at a distance, silhouettes, partial figures, shadows crossing into frame. Their anonymity adds to the tension. Who are they? What are they doing here? The emptiness gives the viewer room to build their own story. We become less like observers and more like participants, held inside the stillness, waiting uneasily for what comes next.
There’s a distinctly Lynchian quality to it all, and it’s no surprise that Holderfield cites the legendary filmmaker and artist — along with his longtime musical collaborator, Angelo Badalamenti—as influences.
Like Lynch’s iconic creations, Holderfield’s photographs pulse with a surreal intensity. The slow-burning, hypnotic quality of Badalamenti’s compositions enhances this atmosphere in Lynch’s films, a mood Holderfield evokes in his images.
He also names photographers like Robert Adams (particularly his night work) and Todd Hido as significant influences. And, though their themes differ from his own, he also cites Vivian Maier for her uncanny eye and compositional elegance, Diane Arbus for her ability to capture “the soul beneath the surface,” and Sally Mann for creating imagery that, as Holderfield puts it, “bridges the material and spiritual worlds in a way that’s unparalleled.”
What all these artists share—what Holderfield taps into—is a belief that photography isn’t just about what’s shown, but what it evokes. This brings us back to his opening quote: what’s hidden in the darkness, what we imagine, can be just as powerful as what’s depicted in the light. Holderfield’s work thrives in the space between what’s seen and what’s felt, setting the stage for the viewer to create their own story.
All images © Bill Holderfield