"Even when dealing with reality, I try to make it look like fantasy or theater. That's what makes it art for me."
An interview with Andres Serrano by Julie Ault
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I started as a street photographer. I would approach people on the street and take their pictures. One time, I saw a middle-aged man in a dark green coat and cap standing in a doorway. As I approached him, I asked him if I could take his picture. "Wait," he said, as he reached down and picked something up from a small chair behind him. He then looked in the camera and held up a white card with the words, "You are a criminal asshole," across his face as I took his picture. I was always amazed that I found that man there, as if he were waiting for me.
JA: In America the individuals photographed are diverse in many ways, while your use of painted backdrops and uniform distance has a leveling tendency, putting them all on an equal ground. Would you talk about your thinking in doing these portraits in this way?
AS: Isn't that what America is all about? Being on equal ground? Every backdrop was painted especially for one individual. And every individual became part of one picture: America. What you have to remember about my work is that I have always used portraiture as a way of expressing myself. This has been especially true in the case of America. Someone once asked me, "Why don't you do a self-portrait?" And I replied, "What do you think this is? This is a self-portrait."
Page [1] [2] [3] [4]
Page [1] [2] [3] [4]
I started as a street photographer. I would approach people on the street and take their pictures. One time, I saw a middle-aged man in a dark green coat and cap standing in a doorway. As I approached him, I asked him if I could take his picture. "Wait," he said, as he reached down and picked something up from a small chair behind him. He then looked in the camera and held up a white card with the words, "You are a criminal asshole," across his face as I took his picture. I was always amazed that I found that man there, as if he were waiting for me.
JA: In America the individuals photographed are diverse in many ways, while your use of painted backdrops and uniform distance has a leveling tendency, putting them all on an equal ground. Would you talk about your thinking in doing these portraits in this way?
AS: Isn't that what America is all about? Being on equal ground? Every backdrop was painted especially for one individual. And every individual became part of one picture: America. What you have to remember about my work is that I have always used portraiture as a way of expressing myself. This has been especially true in the case of America. Someone once asked me, "Why don't you do a self-portrait?" And I replied, "What do you think this is? This is a self-portrait."
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Andres Serrano. America and other Work
Hardcover 11 x 14.5 in., 368 pages
$ 70.00
$ 70.00
A portrait of post 9/11 America(ns)
Snoop Dogg, 2002. (c) A. Serrano