Spooky, Surreal, Southern: The Work of Clarence John Laughlin, 'Father of American Surrealism'

"There is no exquisite beauty...without some strangeness in the
proportion." That's a line from Edgar Allan Poe, the king of the
dark and eerie, the strange and surreal. It could also describe the
appeal of an exhibition currently on view at the High Museum of
Art, called Strange Light: The Photography of Clarence John
Laughlin . Laughlin has been called "Edgar Allan Poe with a
camera." He was a Louisiana native and Southern photographer known
as the "Father of American Surrealism." A fascinating and irascible
character, Laughlin broke boundaries with photographic innovations
that linked imagery to the subconscious.