Published by Prestel

Author: John Jonas Gruen with a foreward by Justin Spring
Book Type: Hardcover
Pages: Approx. 100 pages with 85 duotone illustrations

Size: 9 1/2 x 12 in. /24 x 30 cm.

Item #: 6073
Name: Facing the Artist
Price: $39.95





About this book...
Although celebrity is the topic of this volume, it is not necessarily the theme of the individual photographs. Gruen took many of these portraits well before the artists featured acquired fame and fortune. Instead of glamorous shots, taken paparazzi-style for a quick sale to the tabloids, these are insightful portraits, instances of innocent eavesdropping on conversations between photographer and subject.

For well over half a century, John Jonas Gruen has been observing artists. As a photographer, critic, and composer, his encounters with the movers and shakers of the NewYork art scene make him one of the most experienced chroniclers of personalities in the late 20th century. For the first time ever, Gruen has assembled the best of his photographic portraits in book form, offering an exclusive glimpse into the world of art celebrity from 1957 to the present.

Gruen's work in the 1950s for a NewYork photo agency put him into contact with some of the greatest photographers of the day, including Brassa'i, Robert Doisneau, Bill Brandt, Sabine Weiss, and Man RaY These relationships and Gruen's subsequent work as an art critic for leading publications such as the New York Herald Tribune and ARTnews magazine gave him exposure and experience, which he matched with boundless energy and attitude.The result is a fascinating and unique series of portraits which brilliantly captures the essence of such well-known artists as Keith Haring,Jasper Johns, and Yoko Ono.The photographs radiate a warmth that reveals Gruen's friendship with his subjects, with a powerful, moving sensitivity.

A Selection of Artists Leonard Bernstein € Chuck Close € John Coplans € Eric Fischl € Dan Flavin € Gilbert and George € Keith Haring € Jasper Johns € Willem de Kooning € Roy Lichtenstein € Arthur Miller € Bruce Nauman € Yoko Ono € Robert Rauschenberg € George Segal € Frank Stella € Bill Viola € William Wegman € Jane Wilson € Robert Wilson

The Photographer John Jonas Gruen was born in Paris, and later moved to New York City to pursue a career in music and journalism. In the 1950s Gruen began taking photographs of artists, musicians, actors, writers, and poets, amassing an archive of photographs which has been exhibited in galleries in the IJ.S. His work in the 1960s as an art and music critic furthered his contacts, culminating in this, his first ever book of photography.