Michael Crouser

MichaelCrouser was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and eventually graduated from Saint John’s University. He began taking photographs when he was 14-years- old, where he set up a dark room in his parent’s basement. While working in the commercial photography industry for several years after college,

Crouser began a personal project that ultimately took 15 years to complete, and became his first monograph, called Los Toros. This is one of Crouser’s two project that I found extremely interesting. Los Toros received first place in the category of Fine Art Book at the 2008 International Photography Awards. This book is the exploration of bullfighting around the world.

The other project is Mountain Ranch, which Crouser has now been working on for nine years, explores the disappearing profession of cattle ranching in the mountains of Colorado.

Crouser also produced another well recognized book called Dog Run that focuses on how intensely dogs play in urban dog parks.

These projects appealed to me because they relate to both a way of life I’ve grown up in, as well as the type of photos I strive to take every time I take photos. The vintage tone of Crouser’s photos, as well as the way he captures emotions in faces, along with capturing descriptive action during important moment of the subject he is photographing give the photos a very attractive look and pull on many of your emotions.