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Thread: ART/ARCHITECTURE; Chuck Close Rediscovers the Art in an Old Method

  1. #1
    Tin Can's Avatar
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    ART/ARCHITECTURE; Chuck Close Rediscovers the Art in an Old Method

    Old news from the year 2000

    I never read this until just now in a newsletter from another member here


    https://www.nytimes.com/2000/03/12/a...ld-method.html

    from a paragraph in above, "Mr. Close has produced an extensive series of daguerreotype self-portraits"

    I'm late to the party again!
    Tin Can

  2. #2
    Drew Wiley
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    Re: ART/ARCHITECTURE; Chuck Close Rediscovers the Art in an Old Method

    Some of those get selected for huge scale reproduction by various novel means, done in this area. I was marginally or peripherally involved in a couple of those projects in terms of how-to conversation and supplying certain items of equipment. He's still the primary client of Magnolia Editions out here, perhaps the world's premier alt photo lab for those very few people who can afford it. But they teach classes too. Look into the silk tapestries up to 60 ft across of those daguerrotypes - not printed upon with ink, but intricately woven with many many shades of silk thread. He's genetically incapable of face recognition, even his own, hence his obsession with the theme.

    The most interesting project I was consulted on involved a giant jigsaw puzzle color self-portrait using 22 species of exotic hardwood. After the scan, this was laser-mapped, but could not be either laser cut or CNC done. I won't gone into details, but their labor charge was 40K, and they lost money at that! But they did it for the challenge, and just shrugged their shoulders and said they'd make up the difference on the next Chuck Close project. Most of these pieces sell for over a million apiece to museums or civic installations. NYC has quite a few.

  3. #3
    おせわに なります! Andrew O'Neill's Avatar
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    Re: ART/ARCHITECTURE; Chuck Close Rediscovers the Art in an Old Method

    I prefer is super realist drawings.

  4. #4
    Drew Wiley
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    Re: ART/ARCHITECTURE; Chuck Close Rediscovers the Art in an Old Method

    He's been seriously physically handicapped for quite awhile now, and that factors into his ability to still paint or not. But I tend to get bored with just one self-portrait after another. Many of the photos tend to have a distinct wide-angle distortion to them, kinda like the big squirrel-nosed selfies people get with their cell phone closeups. ... speaking of which, my wife took a really big squirrel-nose closeup of our pet tree squirrel.

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    おせわに なります! Andrew O'Neill's Avatar
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    Re: ART/ARCHITECTURE; Chuck Close Rediscovers the Art in an Old Method

    I've been reading up on him. He made Woodburytypes, too. Wow!

  6. #6
    Pieter's Avatar
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    Re: ART/ARCHITECTURE; Chuck Close Rediscovers the Art in an Old Method

    I have and thoroughly enjoy his book of Daguerrotype portraits (accompanied by poetry), Another Way of Doing Things. There is a bit of the behind the scenes info at the end of the book.

  7. #7
    Tin Can's Avatar
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    Re: ART/ARCHITECTURE; Chuck Close Rediscovers the Art in an Old Method

    PM in public to hornstanj

    Since you delete the few and evasive Public Posts and comments you deign to offer quickly

    then send mysterious PM which also disappear

    AND block all return PM's

    yet request 'return receipt read' with your PM, which we don't have to do

    you are unworthy of any consideration

    no other way to communicate with mr mystery

    WHY BOTHER
    Tin Can

  8. #8
    Drew Wiley
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    Re: ART/ARCHITECTURE; Chuck Close Rediscovers the Art in an Old Method

    I didn't know about the Woodbury types, but that is one of the processes I discussed with them about reviving in some more modernized fashion, specifically by laser-etching epoxy blocks. But there were some massive hazmat issues in this area, with an equivalent level of health issues behind that. A lead plate version was briefly available in NYC but then itself ran into a big enviro snag of its own. Perhaps the original antique method of it has been revived. An interesting question for someone else to sleuth.

  9. #9

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    Re: ART/ARCHITECTURE; Chuck Close Rediscovers the Art in an Old Method

    Quote Originally Posted by Drew Wiley View Post
    I didn't know about the Woodbury types, but that is one of the processes I discussed with them about reviving in some more modernized fashion, specifically by laser-etching epoxy blocks. But there were some massive hazmat issues in this area, with an equivalent level of health issues behind that. A lead plate version was briefly available in NYC but then itself ran into a big enviro snag of its own. Perhaps the original antique method of it has been revived. An interesting question for someone else to sleuth.
    Years ago visited a fellow photographer in NYC who was doing alternative processes, mostly daguerreotypes, in his very, very small lower NYC apartment. I was shocked that he had no proprietary ventilation system installed, and in the winter months kept all the windows closed. FYI: I did cut my visit short because of an excuse that I had come up with.

  10. #10
    Drew Wiley
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    Re: ART/ARCHITECTURE; Chuck Close Rediscovers the Art in an Old Method

    It gets even worse. When I was researching heavy-metal dye mordants, I was surprised at all the nitpicky paperwork potentially involved, and learned that it was because idiots had begun smoking vanadium and chromium salts! This began in Amsterdam and spread to the US. That stuff is worse than mercury!

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