Joel Sternfeld

American photographer Joel Sternfeld has spent decades documenting the landscapes and everyday scenes of contemporary America. Born in New York in 1944, he became known for his large-format colour photography at a time when colour was still gaining recognition as a serious artistic medium. His photographs often depict ordinary places and seemingly uneventful moments, but there is usually more to them than first meets the eye. A quiet street, an open field or a group of people going about their day can suggest a larger story about the people who inhabit these spaces. Rather than directing attention towards a single subject, Sternfeld allows details within the frame to shape how a scene is understood.

Published in 1987, American Prospects is one of Sternfeld’s best-known projects. Developed over approximately eight years of travelling across the United States with an 8×10-inch view camera, the series explores the country through its landscapes, communities and everyday situations. His photographs often contain an unexpected element: a house on fire behind a roadside pumpkin stand, or an unusual encounter unfolding within an otherwise ordinary setting.

These details introduce a sense of uncertainty, humour or unease, leaving the viewer to piece together what might be happening. The carefully observed compositions and muted colours give the images a distinctive visual character, while the scenes themselves offer glimpses of a country shaped by its own contradictions.

In An Hour, A Minute, Sternfeld looks back to an earlier stage of his photographic practice. Made between 1971 and 1980, the series brings together colour photographs taken before the large-format approach that would define American Prospects. Working with 35mm film, he explored colour, composition and the possibilities of recording everyday life. The photographs offer a more immediate view of his surroundings, capturing moments that might otherwise pass unnoticed. Seen alongside his later work, the series provides an insight into the development of his visual language and his continuing interest in how a photograph can hold a moment in time.

For A Brief Stay, Sternfeld travelled to four Sunparks holiday resorts in Belgium in the summer of 2003, photographing people taking time away from their everyday routines. Families and holidaymakers occupy a temporary setting designed for leisure, offering a glimpse of the small rituals and expectations associated with a break from ordinary life. The project is accompanied by a text in which Sternfeld reflects on the hope people bring to these brief periods of escape: the possibility of rest, renewed relationships or simply a moment of happiness.

Beneath the apparent ease of the scenes lies an awareness that these moments are temporary. The photographs capture not only a place to spend a holiday, but also the desire to pause, reconnect and experience something different, even briefly.

Across these three projects, Sternfeld returns to the relationship between people and the environments they move through. His photographs are attentive to the details that make a scene specific, while leaving room for ambiguity and interpretation. Some images suggest broader social or cultural tensions; others hold onto quieter moments of connection, solitude or escape. What links them is Sternfeld’s interest in the stories that exist within everyday life, often just beneath the surface. Rather than offering a definitive explanation, his photographs invite viewers to spend time with a scene and consider what might be happening beyond what is immediately visible.