{"data":{"id":"275","type":"artist","attributes":{"id":275,"topgoose_id":2601,"tms_id":275,"display_name":"Chuck Close","sort_name":"Close Chuck","display_date":"1940–2021","begin_date":"1940","end_date":"2021","biography":"\u003cp\u003eSince the late 1960s, Chuck Close has created larger-than-life, photo-based portraits of friends, family members, and fellow artists, which he calls “heads.” Prior to that time he painted in an Abstract Expressionist style, but renounced it for a more predetermined way of working: he began tracing grids over photographs of faces and transferred and enlarged them onto canvas, by the quarter-inch unit, using an airbrush filled with black paint. This methodical technique aligns Close’s output as much with the systematic rigor of some Minimalist and Conceptual art as with the Photorealism with which it is often linked. \u003ca href=\"/collection/works/1425\"\u003e\u003cem\u003ePhil\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/a\u003e—derived from a photograph of the composer Philip Glass, on which Close based a number of subsequent works—was among the first of these monumental black-and-white portraits. At the time, Glass was working as an assistant to the artist \u003ca href=\"/artists/1202\"\u003eRichard\nSerra\u003c/a\u003e, and Close professed an interest in\nmaking “portraits of people who are in\nthe arts but not famous.” Close’s images\nare exacting and dispassionate; they\nexpose every minute facial detail, however\nunflattering, and yet, unlike conventional\nportraiture, reveal little about the characters\nof their subjects.\u003c/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn 1970 Close started to work in color, adopting the layering processes used in color printing. He covered his surfaces in matrices of small dots, arranged in grids—abstract marks that coalesced into figurative depictions of faces. He began using his hand directly again in 1978, impressing his inked fingerprints on a grid and varying their density in order to convey texture and modeling.\u003cem\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/em\u003e\u003ca href=\"/collection/works/34584\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eMark/Fingerprint\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/a\u003e pictures \u003ca href=\"/artists/8889\"\u003eMark Greenwold\u003c/a\u003e—an artist Close first depicted in the early 1970s—using his fingerprints and red, yellow, and blue ink. Since the late 1980s, Close’s work has expanded beyond painting and prints to include photographs and tapestry portraits.\u003c/p\u003e","on_view":false,"artport":false,"biennial":true,"collection":true,"ulan_id":"500031023","wikidata_id":"Q453883","created_at":"2017-08-30T17:28:18.000-04:00","updated_at":"2026-04-13T07:04:00.574-04:00","links":{"artworks":"/api/artists/275/artworks","exhibitions":"/api/artists/275/exhibitions"}}}}