Summary

"Up Close & Personal is more than just a stunning collection of photographs of some of the best-known actors, singers arid other entertainers of our own time; it is, quite deliberately, an exploration in portraiture of the ephemeral and intangible qualities of fame and celebrity. Photographer Jeff Dunas is concerned not so much with who his sitters are as with how they have risen to a position of representing us in our fantasies, why we as the audience can so easily identify with this group of individuals, arid whether as a group they have certain qualities that others of us would not seem to possess. Common sense would indicate that the stars depicted--among them the actresses Angelina Jolie, Nastassja Kinski and Gillian Anderson, the actors Martin Sheen, Nick Note and the singers Neil Diamond, B.B. King and James Brown--are all 'normal' people, yet there is something about them that draws us in, entertains us, and allows us to utilize them as substitutes for ourselves in our inner lives. When we, as members of the public, confront these famous individuals in real life, it is not unusual for us to react as though we have stepped across the dimensions into a realm where our mirror image separates itself from us--quite air unnerving experience. Dunas's rich arid engaging photographs have much the same effect.