Holly Veselka

Night Happens in the Background: An Archive of Cinematic Night

Night Happens in the Background: The Inn of the Sixth Happiness, 1958

archival pigment print, 24 x 32 in., 2017,

This ongoing project uses photography to document artificial night on screen. Because of the restrictions of low light environments, cinematic nighttime is often faked with elaborate sets and camera tricks. The photos in this series look for these constructed sets. They represent moments when nighttime becomes an agent itself, driving narrative, setting mood, defining intention. These are fleeting moments: an extended and frozen night inside a studio becomes seconds of background imagery. I stream movies online and shoot the photos with my cell phone held close to the computer, eliminating figurative elements. The results are bright, pixilated, showing the artifice of the screen. The constant presence of the physical world is evident even in the designed realities of our virtual experiences.

All photos are pigmented prints, 24 x 32 in., editions of 10.