In the Studio with Pace Prints: Chuck Close’s Portrait
“Chuck Close’s portrait took two or three years and more than 200 colors, which means 200 separate screens. The edition was big—an edition of 80—and the [size of] the print was so big that we couldn’t use the drying rack; so for that project, we had to use a hanging rack. When the size of the print is big, everything has to be big. You see, the tables—and even before the tables, the screens, and the shooting screens, have to be bigger. So it takes up lots of room. [For the print pictured,] he was involved in this for a month of time, very small. Maybe a dozen times we came up with a proof, showed it to him, and he says, ‘oh, I want this to be more this way or that way.’ You know, he doesn’t really care about each individual shape or color. It’s more of an impression he had from the picture. Good artists always have this ability of removing their emotions from being too close to the subject. They don’t drown themselves in their own emotions. That’s a really bad artist. [Laughs.]”
Photographs by Alex John Beck
