Artist Notes

Chuck Close

Artist Background Born - 1940, Monroe, WASHINGTON American painter and printmaker

OverviewChuck Close (b. 1940, Monroe, WA) is renowned for his highly inventive techniques of painting the human face, 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.

PracticeOver the years, Close's works have evolved from harsh black-and-white images to colorful and brightly patterned canvases of an almost abstract painterliness. His rigorously systematic approach and often visibly gridded formats more nearly approximate those of the minimal and process artists who emerged alongside him in the late 1960s. Abstract Expressionist - A tendency among New York painters of the late 1940s and '50s, all of whom were committed to an expressive art of profound emotion and universal themes. The movement embraced the gestural abstraction of Willem de Kooning and Jackson Pollock, and the color field painting of Mark Rothko and others. It blended elements of Surrealism and abstract art in an effort to create a new style fitted to the postwar mood of anxiety and trauma. The creative process is as important to Close as the finished product. Photorealism--A style of painting in which an image is created in such exact detail that it looks like a photograph; uses everyday subject matter, and often is larger than life. grisaille--A painting technique using only grey tints. pointillism--A painting technique in which a white background is covered with tiny dots of pure color that fuse when seen from a distance producing a luminous visual effect. Minimalism--A style of art in which the least possible amount of form shapes, colors, or lines are used to reduce the concept or idea to its simplest form (geometric shapes, progressions). Impressionism--A movement in painting in which the emphasis on light and color, loose brush strokes, ordinary subject matter; creates the "impression" of a moment in time. Dabs and strokes of color are used to depict the natural appearances of objects and reflected light.

Main Themes Photorealism developed as a reaction to the detachment of Minimalism and conceptual art, which did not depict representational images. Close's dependence on the grid as a metaphor for his analytical processes, which suggest that the "whole" is rarely more (or less) than the sum of its parts, is a conceptual equivalent for the camera's analytical, serial approach to any given subject. Every street-smart, colorful Polaroid is as much a time-based and fragmentary gesture as any more laborious stroke of the painter's brush in the cloistered studio. Chuck turned to portraiture, suggesting it as a means for exploring unsettling aspects of how self-identity is always a composite and highly constructed, if not ultimately conflicted fiction.

Influences - Spinal artery collapse - Avant-garde American art of the previous two decades - Avant-garde - new and unusual or experimental ideas, especially in the arts, or the people introducing them. - Dyslexic

Quotes “It’s not an accident that I became an artist. I couldn’t run, I couldn’t walf, I couldn’t catch a ball, so I couldn’t keep up with my friends, so I decided that I wanted to keep people around me.” “If an illusion is strong enough, and you show how you made that illusion, it only adds more.”

Chuck Close - Artwork One

Big Self-Portrait (1967-68) He incorporated every detail of the photograph and allowed himself no interpretative freedom. Working from photographs enabled him to realize the variations in focus due to changing depth of field, something impossible when working from life. He continued in the black-and-white style until 1970. The tentative air of experimentation that might be said to characterize Big Nude is nowhere apparent in Big Self-Portrait, a watershed painting that virtually showcases Close's unique method. Abandoning the full-body view, Close turned to one of the oldest traditions anywhere in art history, the self-portrait. Close had partially set out to refute the critic Clement Greenberg's claim that it was impossible for an "advanced" artist to work in portraiture. Close’s untraditional approach involved conceiving of and creating a unique kind of "mug shot," a black-and-white idiom that exacerbated the subject's blemishes and the original photographic distortion caused by the camera. The devotion to the idea of an unsparing, head-on view led him to refuse all commissions, as Close used only his own "mug" and that of close friends for his subjects. Big Self-Portrait, in black and white, was the first of Close's mural-sized works painted from photographs. This painting took four months to complete. To make this work, Close took several photographs of himself in which his head and neck filled the frame. From these he selected one of the images and made two 11 x 14-inch enlargements. On one of the photographs he drew a grid, then lettered and numbered each square. Using both the gridded and ungridded photographs, he carefully transferred the photographic image square by square onto a large canvas measuring 107 1/2 x 83 1/2 inches. He used acrylic paint and an airbrush to include every detail. When Close was making his painting he was concerned with the visual elements--shapes, textures, volume, shadows, and highlights--of the photograph itself. He also was interested in how a photograph shows some parts of the image in focus, or sharp, and some out-of-focus, or blurry. In this portrait the tip of the cigarette and the hair on the back of his head were both out-of-focus in the photograph so he painted them that way in Big Self-Portrait.

Chuck Close - Artwork Two

Bob (1970)The large painting Bob (1970) is part of a suite of 8 black and white portraits that Close painted between 1967 and 1970. These works are considered to be Close’s breakthrough into portraiture, beginning with a selfportrait and finishing with the painting Keith (1970). Bob is an important work in Close’s career and its inclusion in the exhibition provides an important context within which subsequent works can be viewed. These early works were made using a gridded black and white photo as the base image. They were then painted in black and white on a white ground using an airbrush. Close used razor blades or an electric razor to cut back the black to build up white highlights. The work has an alarming, photorealist clarity, and viewers are often shocked to find it is a painting rather than a large photograph. This is the visual conundrum of the work it’s a painting of a photo as much as it is a painting of an individual. At the time it was made the art movement Photorealism was being developed and increasingly feature in exhibitions across Europe, America and Australia, but Close’s work is related more to the concurrent movements of Minimalism and Conceptualism. The painting follows a strict schematic based on the grid, a structure so pervasive in minimal and conceptual art, and applying it in a strictly deadpan way to the face. The sitter is Close’s friend Robert Israel, a New York based designer. Close also made a video portrait of Israel Slow Pan/Bob (1970) which is the only film work that Close has completed

Jonathan Jones

Artist Background Born 1978, Age 37 Aboriginal Australian Member of the Wiradjuri and Kamilaroi nations of south-east Australia Based in Sydney

Overview Sydney-based Aboriginal artist Jonathan Jones, a member of the Wiradjuri and Kamilaroi nations of southeast Australia, works across a range of mediums, from printmaking and drawing to sculpture and film. He creates site-specific installations and interventions into space that use light, subtle shadow and the repetition of shape and materiality to explore Indigenous practices, relationships and ideas. Jones often works with everyday materials, such as fluorescent lights and blue tarpaulin, recycled and repurposed to explore relationships between community and the individual, the personal and public, historical and contemporary.

PracticeMediums; Printmaking Drawing Sculpture Film Installation Site specific installationsWorks with everyday materials such as; Fluorescent lights Blue tarpaulin Uses recycled and repurposed materialsCollaborations with artists and communities

Main Themes Light, subtle shadow, repetition of shape Explores Indigenous practices, relationships and ideas Relationships between; o Community and the individual o Personal and public o Historical and contemporary Jones has sought to represent both the traditional and contemporary by working with the particular site’s historical usage and current vision. Often perceived as oppositional, these two frameworks are in fact linked, sharing commonalities and connections; Jones’s artworks serve to honour both contexts. Connects sites with local concerns Aboriginal cultural influence

Jonathan Jones - Artwork One

naa (to see or look) 2015fluorescent tubes, fittings, electrical cable In naa (to see or look) lines of fluorescent tubes map the star trails of Sydney’s south-eastern night sky. The work reflects on the site of Warrane (Sydney Cove) and on the histories that unfolded there. In particular it responds to the narrative of Lieutenant William Dawes, the First Fleet astronomer camped at Tarra (Dawes Point), whose records reveal a deep engagement with the local Aboriginal people of the Eora nation. Dawes recorded the language through conversations with several Eora people, including Patyegarang, a young woman whose voice is heard again and again in his notebooks. Their exchanges revealed many shared stories of the lieutenant’s brief stay in Warrane. Now held in the University of London, fragments of these records survive and continue to inform Eora today. The remarkable friendship between Patyegarang and William Dawes finds its visual equivalence in the relationship between light and dark in Jones’s installation. Each star, a word; its movement, the word spoken – with naa (to see or look) Jones considers how Dawes came to understand Eora, charting the language as he did the night sky. Naa – local Eora word Site Specific Traditional owners of site – gadigal people of Eora nation Collision of aboriginal nation and British empire Lieutenant William Dawes – Dawes point (MCA location) – observe stars on observatory hill – engaged with Eora people Compare stars to language – each star as they move across the sky. Each could represent a word – communication –connecting with eachother Two note books of William about language – naa is first word – perspective and way others engage with sites

Quotes “The sky, as an extension of country, embodies knowledge. Stars and their light can be read like words on a page, recalling culture, memorising and marking the way forward. In this way culture is never lost; country will always remind us.” – Jonathan Jones 2015

Jonathan Jones - Artwork Two

untitled (illuminated tree) 2012 wood, natural pigment, fluorescent tubes and fittings, electrical cable, framed dimensions variable This installation was originally shown earlier this year in the Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art. Jonathan was concerned with making a connection to the local, and looked at the landscape of the south- east and the region’s main artery, the Murray-Darling River system. The rivers connect both Kamilaroi and Wiradjuri in the upper catchment with Ngarrindjeri at the mouth of the river. This connection is the foundation to the region’s traditions, including linguistic commonalities where languages like Kamilaroi and Wiradjuri are set on similar syntax to that of Ngarrindjeri in the south. During the initial stages of colonisation the rivers’ connection was evident, with smallpox carried along the river ahead of any contact with white people, severely decimating the population.

Quotes "I am challenging western romanticism and perspective, and critiquing the grand, colonial narratives of western art that have been imposed on an Australian setting to create a new Aboriginal framework." “Jones’s art revels in simplicity but comes with layers of meaning. ‘Untitled (illuminated tree)’ is made up of pieces of wood representing a fallen tree, and is lit with fluorescent tubes like those bought at hardware stores. It’s a visual narrative of the Murray-Darling river system and places the spotlight on issues brought about by the colonisation of the landscape through which the rivers flow. Jones’ never shies away from politics and this piece provides an Indigenous perspective by seeking to redress romantic colonial (white) depictions of Australia in art history, where the siting of a tall tree would often take the foreground of a picture. By reworking subject matter and inverting meaning, the artist is suggesting that such art could more appropriately be considered propaganda.” -Sharne Wolff “Jonathan Jones' untitled (illuminated tree) reveals an intense engagement with both the representational traditions and broad political and cultural interplay between settler and indigenous Australian cultures. It's a display of mastery but also independence of the symbolism of the sort of Fine Art/High Art vocabulary that has only recently acknowledged Australian Aboriginal art in a way that's not straight up ethnographic. It's a reinforcement of the (longevity and contemporary expressive force of the modes of symbolic expression existing in Aboriginal art.” – Bethany Small