Martin Schoeller's coffee-table book Close presents 120 portraits of the world's most famous and influential people from the arts and entertainment industry, politics, business and sports, from Julia Roberts and Adele to Frank Gehry and Marina Abramovic, Barack Obama, Julian Assange and Roger Federer.
Between 2005 and 2018, Schoeller photographed his subjects, in his words "to create a level platform where the viewer's existing conceptions of celebrity, values and honesty are challenged." Schoeller realized this goal by treating his portrayed subjects as technically equal: each portrait is a close-up of a face with the same camera angle and lighting. The expressions are consistently neutral, serious yet relaxed, in an effort to explore the differences between his subjects and capture moments "that feel intimate and unposed."
Schoeller's inspiration for Close was Bernd and Hilla Becher's water tower series, his ambition to adapt their systematic approach to portraiture. Among Schoeller's famous subjects are also some unknown and unfamiliar ones, a way of making his project an "informal anthropological study of the faces of our time."
Specifications
Title: Martin Schoeller: Close
Publisher: Steidl
Size: 286 x 360 x 24 mm
Size: 136 pages
Weight: 2057 grams
Language: English
Material: Hardcover
ISBN: 9783958294912
