Chuck Close
Chuck Close’s art is as significant as his story. Born in Monroe, Washington in 1940, Close graduated from the University of Washington, and then went to Yale for his master’s degree in art. He won a Fulbright scholarship to study in Vienna, and then moved to New York in 1968. In 1969, Close’s work was included in the prestigious Whitney Biennial. He had taken small black and white photographs that he transformed into huge paintings. Each painting had a photo realistic look. He accomplished this by structuring the painting into a series of small grids. Close-up, each grid looked like a small abstract painting; from a distance, the grids coalesce into a unified whole image. Close has also gone back to rework previous images from the original photographs. For example, a depiction of Philip Glass was exhibited in his black and white series of 1969; in 1977, the same image was rendered in water colors; in 1978, again the same image was used to make a painting made with a stamp pad and fingerprints; and then in 1982 Close used gray paper to render Glass’ image, yet again. These images, first in black and white, and then later with color in the 70’s, always concentrated on photographic portraits he had taken of subjects -- from the neck up. In 1988, after giving a speech at an art awards celebration, Close suffered a collapsed spinal artery. The spinal blood clot left him almost completely paralyzed. At first he painted with a brush held by his teeth. Although now confined to a wheel chair, Close recovered some movement in an arm. To keep working, he has a brush holding device that straps to his wrist and forearm. His newer works echo stylistically his earlier projects, although refracted through the lens of his current disability.
