Video: Candid portraits of Martin Scheller, for whom famous politicians and show business stars are ready to pose
2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55
This German photographer takes close-ups of celebrities' faces, without embellishment, highlighting every wrinkle, every nuance in their appearance. Such pictures, one might say, intimate, speak of absolute trust in the person standing on the other side of the camera lens. All works Martin Schoeller, can be seen from June 20 at the Berlin art gallery Camera Work. What is the secret of this man's success, who brought photography to a new level?
Martin Scholler Born March 12, 1968 in Munich, raised in Frankfurt am Main, he now lives in New York. Father - famous German TV journalist and literary critic Wilfried F. Scheller (1941-2020). The photographer also has a sister - Bettina, she is a director. The Scholler family is incredibly creative and intelligent. Martin became famous thanks to a series of portraits. The shooting was incredibly realistic, all the portraits are close-ups, the same lighting, the same style. No retouching! No social differences, in his photographs everyone is equal - world political leaders, movie and sports stars, homeless people, representatives of indigenous peoples.
Martin studied photography in Berlin. The photographer was greatly influenced by the work of such personalities as August Zander, Bern and Hilla Becher. In his work, Scholler willingly uses Zander's portrait ideas, and Becher's stylistics.
The photographer moved to New York in 1993. There he became an assistant to Annie Leibovitz. This has served him very well in gaining invaluable experience with major publications and advertisers. Also, together with the Leibovitz team, Martin traveled all over the world and made many useful acquaintances with famous personalities. Professional photography was easy for Scholler. He can safely consider himself not just a technical photographer, but a real artist.
Two years later, Martin came up with the idea of creating a series of portraits using a specific shooting technique. In 1996, Martin left Leibovitz and went on a free voyage. At first, he was in a creative search, offered his works to various publications. For a long time these were unsuccessful attempts. The editors did not really understand his big plans. Everything was changed by the photo session of Vanessa Redgrave, to which Scholler was invited by a familiar photo editor. After that, the photographer literally woke up famous. There was simply no end of orders now!
Now his work is presented in the largest galleries around the world. Among them are Kraeutler Gallery in New York, Ace Gallery in Los Angeles, Camera Work in Germany. Scholler is often published in such eminent publications as Rolling Stone, TIME, GQ, Esquire, Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times Magazine. Mega-famous brands (HTC, A&E, Lexus, Mercedes Benz, CNN and others) order him to shoot their advertising campaigns. World stars pose for him without hesitation. He filmed everyone from Angela Merkel and Barack Obama to Michael Douglas and Hugh Jackman.
The photographer, who in the old days was interrupted by odd jobs and slept four hours a day, now sleeps longer and much calmer. Worldwide fame, a whole team of reliable assistants. Martin participates in all work processes independently. Star fever is not about him.
Martin Scholler travels a lot. After all, often at a photo session you need to go to the most different countries of the world. The photographer is involved in charity work. He donates the proceeds from his portraits of transgender people and homeless people to various charities.
Scholler's acutely social photo projects provoke active discussion in the community. Not so long ago he presented his project "Survivors". Martin filmed Holocaust survivors.
The exhibition in Dusseldorf contains photographs from the most resonant project of Scholler - these are portraits of those sentenced to death by judicial error, portraits of innocent people who have been in US prisons for many years. Persons bearing the stamp of bitterness and injustice. The trust of these people was not easy for Martin, but it was worth it. This is life.
Scholler's new work, exhibited in Berlin at the Camera Work gallery, makes a very similar impression. Famous German painters, filmmakers and musicians such as Udo Lindenberg, Herbert Grönemeyer or Campino, frontman of the Düsseldorf punk band Die Toten Hosen, also allow the photographer to read their life story from their face. Martin Scholler is someone who can not only see it, but also show it in close-up, as it is, without embellishment.
Unusual photos from the Swiss photographer in our article why photographer Jens Krauer is called invisible: city shots with meaning.
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