Building Sets with Bobby Becker

History: XV, Bobby Becker

Most photographers travel to find unique and interesting locations for their portraiture. Conceptual artist Bobby Becker, on the other hand, creates his sets by hand. I first found Becker’s inspirational work under his Flickr-handle ‘Excavate‘ three years ago while networking with other surrealist and conceptual portrait photographers. Needless to say, I was blown away by his imagination and quality of work, and quickly began following him online.

When I saw this image on Instagram, I felt compelled to ask how he creates his beautiful, sterile environments. Turns out, Becker builds them, and he was gracious enough to share with me some images from behind the scene. He works inside of a small warehouse space divided up between nine other artists, working in a part of it typically used for shows or bigger installation works such as this. Check out his process in the snapshots he sent me below.

An impressive amount of effort put into a single great image. The dripping paint, which he did not capture process photos of, is a recurring motif in his work, and something he does during the photoshoot itself. When he’s done, he takes the materials apart so that he can reuse most of the wood. 

Check out more of Bobby Becker’s amazing photography on his Flickr account or follow his handle @excavatephoto on Instagram.

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Best regards,
John Dykstra