For Grierson, the visual world has its own rhythms and language, more profound than the spoken word: "I'm always primarily interested in the medium and how different the world looks when photographed. It's this sense of discovery within the work which fuels my imagination, and which I hope will provoke a similar response from the viewer." Whilst the work ranges from street photographs through to constructed images, his primary interest is in the new meanings that emerge as disparate elements and surfaces come into contact with one another and abstract reality. This lack of information within the fragment, divorced from its original context of time and space, is seen as offering greater scope for the imagination. Grierson has said that some of his more constructed images, "owe as much to the spatial surrealism of Beckett and Kafka, or the investigation of surface by Tapies, as they do to other practitioners of photography."

Nigel Grierson studied photography and film at the Royal College of Art. He is perhaps best known for the album sleeves he photographed and designed for 4AD under the name 23 envelope in partnership with Vaughan Oliver. These have been hailed by the likes of design historian, Catherine McDermot, and founder of 'Eye Magazine', Rick Poynor, as amongst the most important design of the eighties and early nineties. In 2000, after a successful career directing music videos and TV commercials in both Europe and America, Grierson gave up commercial work to pursue his own photography full time. He has had one man shows in Japan and the USA and his work is in the collection of the V&A Museum.