(from France 24, 8/20; Text: News Wires; Photo: In this December 3, 2008 photo, people examine a self-portrait by the artist Chuck Close at Art Basel Miami Beach in Florida. © Joe Raedle, AFP.)
Chuck Close, a painter, photographer and printmaker best known for his monumental grid portraits and photo-based paintings of family and famous friends, has died. He was 81.
His attorney, John Silberman, said Close died Thursday at a hospital in Oceanside, New York. He did not give a cause of death.
Close, whose professional highlights include a solo exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1973, was known for using a grid structure for the representation of an image in nearly all of his works, which he said helped him break the face down into “incremental units.”
Time consuming and labor intensive, he produced a plethora of paintings that dissect the human face of such luminaries as President Bill Clinton, composer Philip Glass and the artist himself.
His works have been displayed in museums, galleries and even the New York City subway.
