Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #67193 in DVD
• Released on: 2003-12-16
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
• Formats: Color, DVD, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 57 minutes

From the Back Cover
Since 1969, when Chuck Close's first series of black-and-white portraits was exhibited, his paintings have fascinated the public and raised critical controversy. Created from Polaroid photographs, Close's huge close-ups (some as tall as 9 feet) are severe, confrontational, and wholly compelling. Featuring interviews with Close, Chuck Close: A Portrait in Progress traces the artist's evolution. Close, who paints in the pointillist style, spends months on one painting. Today, his "mug shots" brim with warm colors. Dubbed the "mayor of Soho," he specializes in portraits of fellow artists, such as Jasper Johns who is interviewed in this program. The affable Close appears throughout, discussing his childhood learning disabilities and how, despite the 1989 illness that left him nearly completely paralyzed, he continues to triumph artistically.

Customer Reviews

A Rare View into the Life of a Modern Artist
As a high school art teacher, I really appreciate a well-made, engaging art video. This is one that kept my students' attention from beginning to end. One of the best things about this video is that the viewer gets to see Chuck Close in his studio painting and talking about art-making. He is shown working on one of his huge self-portraits from its beginning, when he chooses the large-scale photo reference and lays out a grid on a canvas, through the painting's completion. What a great opportunity to see inside the life of one of our most talented and admired modern artists! I highly recommend this video.

a bit slow-paced for my high school students
I bought this video because I wanted my high school students to gain some inspiration and motivation before we embarked on our own self-portraits using the grid method. I read other reviews that claimed the video had students engaged from start to finish. Well, something must be wrong with my students because I showed it in two different periods and in both classes I had more than half the students falling asleep or putting their heads down!! Those that paid attention stayed awake by doodling or doing homework. Maybe it was my fault by not assigning notes or a worksheet on the video but I wanted my students to just relax and watch some good art in the process. They relaxed, alright!
I enjoyed watching the video but I found the sound to be distracting because you hear so much of the background that I had to strain to listen to the dialogue. The video is also a bit slow-paced but that may be due to how we are conditioned by today's media that uses snippets of video and audio in a fast-paced editing format (and our decreasing attention-span).

A must have for any Chuck Close fan.
You get to watch him paint, hear him talk about his work, and listen to what other arist think about his heads. This video is a wonderful retrospective of Chuck Close's grand body of work. You see him work on his mosy recent self-potrait from start to finish. Interviews with Alex Katz, Philip Glass, and Chuck Close's wife Leslie take you deep into Close's art. It does get a little sappy when talking about his "event" and also his father's death, but that's just a personal thing. A great addition to any artist's bookshelf.