Chuck Close is renowned for his highly inventive techniques, and is best known for his large-scale, photo-based portrait paintings. In 1988, Close was paralyzed following a rare spinal artery collapse; he continues to paint using a brush-holding device strapped to his wrist and forearm. His practice extends beyond painting to encompass printmaking, photography, and, most recently, tapestries based on Polaroids.
Read MoreBeginning in 1988, Close faced new personal and artistic challenges after suffering a collapsed spinal artery that initially left him paralyzed from the neck down. Through his remarkable courage and tenacity, his condition improved, and though dependent on a wheelchair, he was able to begin painting again with a customized brace. Close’s work continues to evolve in surprising ways. Incorporating new techniques, from nineteenth-century daguerreotypes to twenty-first-century computer-generated Iris prints, he has remained committed to rigorous experimentation within his rigidly defined practice. Through more than thirty-five years of “isms” and art movements, Close has operated on his own continuum, one that never fails to propel his work to new places.
In 2000, Close was presented with the prestigious National Medal of Arts by President Clinton. Close is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, has served on the board of many arts organizations, and was recently appointed by President Obama to serve on The President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities.
Private curator to Donald B. Marron for over two decades, Matthew Armstrong discusses working with the collector, reminiscing on the boyish enthusiasm Marron exuded when it came to art.
The best art to see online and off from Tuesday 12 to Monday 18 May.
I’ll quote Chuck when he told me that almost every significant breakthrough in his paintings has been as a direct result of something that he’s learned in making a print.
On New Year’s Day, there were two ways you could celebrate 2017 on either end of New York City’s Q train: take it all the way to Coney Island and go for a frigid swim with the Polar Bear Club or journey to three new Manhattan stops nearly a century in the making. The Second Avenue Subway, following long delays, incredible cost, and years of...
When a city has been waiting for a badly needed new subway line since 1929, public art is probably far down the list of expectations, well behind accommodations like a) working trains, b) lights and c) some means of entrance and egress. But when commuters descend into the new Second Avenue subway’s four stations, at 96th, 86th, 72nd and 63rd...
A couple of weeks ago, I went to visit Chuck Close at his beach house on Long Island. The drive there always reminds me of an escape to the Hamptons in reverse. From the aristocratic brownstones of Park Slope, you work your way steadily down the socioeconomic ladder, past the towering Soviet-style apartment complexes of Coney Island, through...
American artist Chuck Close’s singular artistic vision is not something that can be taught, or for that matter explained. In fact, walking through the Sydney Museum of Contemporary Art’s (MCA) “Chuck Close: Prints, Process and Collaboration,” there is a strong sense that Close sees the world differently to everyone else...
