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Home>Yes No Maybe Introduction>Yes No Maybe Close Introduction

# 

Exhibition Introduction

Note to the ReaderAcknowledgments

IntroductionKeithJohnLeslieSelf-Portrait

IntroductionTouched RedGreenCombinationHigh Green Version 1

Introduction17 Drawings by ThoreauSeven Day Diary (Not Knowing)Changes and DisappearancesWhere R=RyoanjiFireThe Missing Stone 75 StonesEninkaStonesWhere There is Where There

IntroductionAnne ApplebyPia FriesDarren AlmondSusan MiddletonJoel FisherBrad BrownTom Marioni

IntroductionMamma AnderssonSol LeWittFred WilsonRobert BechtleKiki Smith

IntroductionJulie MehretuWayne ThiebaudJockum NordströmTomma AbtsNathan OliveiraChris Ofili

IntroductionPat SteirLaura OwensWayne ThiebaudAmy Sillman

# Chuck Close

Yes, No, Maybe: Chuck Close 
*Yes, No, Maybe* exhibition entrance with Chuck Close's *Leslie*, 1986, visible in first gallery

Yes, No, Maybe: Chuck Close 
Chuck Close, *Keith*, 1972, installation view

Yes, No, Maybe: Chuck Close 
Chuck Close, *John,*1972, installation view

Yes, No, Maybe: Chuck Close 
Chuck Close, *Leslie*, 1986, installation view

Yes, No, Maybe: Chuck Close 
Chuck Close, *Self-Portrait*, 2010–2013, installation view

Yes, No, Maybe: Chuck Close 
Chuck Close, *Self-Portait*, 2010–2013, left and foreground; *John*, 1972, right: installation view

Detail,* Chuck Resting among His Images*, 1972, Polaroid, photograph by Kathan Brown, Courtesy Crown Point Press

For Chuck Close (American, born 1940), “self-imposed restrictions” and “severe limitations” offer a paradoxical form of creative liberation. He has maintained a rigorous commitment to interpreting a narrow range of subjects — his own head and those of his friends and family — in new and provocative ways. Working from photographs reminiscent of mug shots or passport photos, Close focuses not on the character or psychology of his sitters but on the physical details of a face’s surface. He explores how various artistic techniques can produce the illusion of a likeness. Process — of making and of perceiving — is central to his work.

Close has taken on a range of technical challenges at Crown Point Press: he tackled mezzotint, an outmoded and demanding process; translated a watercolor into a woodcut; and attempted to extend his tricolor painting practice into printmaking. He relishes “not knowing what you’re going to do, and having to solve a new problem.” This kind of approach has triggered profound breakthroughs — his projects *Keith *and *Leslie *foremost among them. But it does not guarantee success. This gallery also includes two photomechanical projects —* John *and *Self-Portrait *— that represent creative problems ultimately unsolved.

Banner image: Detail, Chuck Close, *John* (proof for unpublished print), 1972, color photo-etching on wove paper, Gift of Kathan Brown © Chuck Close, Courtesy Pace Gallery

Next: Chuck Close, *Keith*, 1972

"Yes, No, Maybe: The Art of Making Decisions," lecture by exhibition curators Judith Brodie and Adam Greenhalgh (audio)Julie Mehretu, artist, in conversation with curator Judith Brodie, Diamonstein-Spielvogel lecture (audio)"An Insider's Perspective," lecture by Kathan Brown, founder of Crown Point Press (audio)

Exhibition tour by curators Judith Brodie and Adam Greenhalgh (audio)

Chuck Close in the collection of the National Gallery of Art

Crown Point Press prints in the collection of the National Gallery of Art

 

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