Life and work
Much of Hido’s early work depicts suburban housing across the United States. While driving at night on the West Coast, he began photographing houses with illuminated windows, a subject that led to his 2001 book House Hunting. [9] Writing in Artforum , Andy Grundberg described these nocturnal houses as positioning the viewer outside the scene, “emphasizing the gulf between private interior and public façade.” [10] In W Magazine , Hido said his photographs “are not about anybody specific … you can place your own memories within them,” a theme that continues throughout his practice. [11]
As his work developed, Hido began incorporating portraits, interiors, and long stretches of rural landscape. Bright Black World (2018) marked his first extensive body of work made outside the U.S., depicting northern environments suffused with snow, ice, and environmental anxiety through a distinct palette of muted blues and blacks. [12] His series The End Sends Advance Warning (2023) continues this exploration of the psychological landscape, using the road and horizon line as recurring metaphors for time and transition. [13]
In 2017, TIME commissioned Hido to photograph locations from Twin Peaks in Washington State, a project he said resonated with his own experiences growing up in rural Ohio. [14]
In 2024, Hido appeared in Episode 2 (“Painting with Light”) of Jason Momoa’s docu-series On the Roam, in which Momoa visits Hido’s studio and travels with him while discussing light, process, and memory. [15]
Hido’s photographs have also influenced popular culture. Director Spike Jonze cited his photograph Untitled #2653 (2000) as a major visual reference for the film Her (2013), describing the image as “feeling like a memory—the mood of a day without the specifics.” [16] The connection was also noted in *Artsy*’s 2024 article “6 Films Inspired by Famous Photographs, from Moonlight to Her.” [17]
Though best known for his quiet and contemplative photographs, Hido has said that his lifelong love of motion continues to inform how he works. His background in BMX instilled an instinct for speed, balance, and risk that translates into his process of photographing on the move—often through the windshield of his car, chasing changing light and weather. [18]
Hido is a dedicated photobook collector with a library of more than 9,000 titles built over three decades, which he uses as a reference for his own projects and research. [19]
Style and influence
Hido’s photographs are often described as cinematic and dreamlike, emphasizing atmosphere and the emotional charge of ordinary settings. He frequently photographs from his car—through rain-streaked or fogged windows—using ambient light to create ambiguity. Writer David Campany observed that Hido “casts a distinctly cinematic eye across suburban housing and eerie landscapes, digging deep into his memory for inspiration.” [1] In LensCulture, Hido explained that “if it is an empty shell, the viewer can place their own memories within it,” underscoring his interest in projection and open narrative. [19]
Hido has expressed a deep interest in vernacular photography and found imagery, describing how he collects “magazine clippings, postcards, and everyday photographs” to use in sequencing and editing his own work. [19] Campany has written that Hido “mines the conventions of vernacular photography—snapshots, postcards, and cinematic stills—without irony,” creating photographs that feel simultaneously personal and collective. [1]
A 2024 profile noted that he “considers himself an artist, not a documentarian,” often working at night in fog or rain and viewing prints and photobooks as integral to his process. [20]
Hido frequently alternates between film and digital cameras depending on light and atmosphere, saying, “I don’t think I could ever not have a film camera in my bag … I don’t ever intend to let that go completely.” [21] Critics such as Michael Grieve have described Hido’s colour palette as “a protagonist in its own right,” heightening the poetic and psychological tone of his work. [22]
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