Famous Eyes

They peered into the eyes of Bryan Adams, Nina Hagen, and Wolfgang Joop: Frankfurt-based artists Daniel and Geo Fuchs spent three years photographing the eyes of the most prominent creative people of our time. Famous Eyes is the name of their project, which offers a startling new look at celebrities whom we thought we knew.

The original idea was to photograph the eyes of star photographers and thus perhaps to discover something about the mystery of their talent. This idea soon widened to include photographs of the eyes of other artists, creative people, musicians, actors, actresses, and architects. We're in the midst of the latest artwork by Daniel and Geo Fuchs, the artist couple whose "Conserving" project brought them worldwide fame. Famous Eyes uses crazy, surprising, and often amusing ideas to highlight the personalities of the people who pose for these portraits.

Celebrities eyes - celebrities in the limelight. Famous Eyes is the gigantically elaborate and artistically overwhelming new photo project by Daniel & Geo Fuchs (Conserving). Famous Eyes was already making headlines even before its publication. The book and its photos are all about eyes - the eyes of well-known people like Otto Sander, David Copperfield, Tom Tykwer, Bryan Adams, Udo Lindenberg, etc., etc.

"Here's looking at you, Kid." But even before "Casablanca," everyone knew that the eyes are the mirror of the soul. Eyes don't lie. And sometimes one can hardly believe one's eyes, for example, when they feast on a fantastic new book called Famous Eyes.

Wait a minute, isn't that ...? It sure is! Photographers Geo and Daniel Fuchs have looked through their lens and gazed into the depths of celebrities' eyes. Their photographic staging is refreshingly diverse and intriguingly new. The resul ts are an interplay between celebrities staging themselves and being staged by the photographers. Some of these famous eyes belong to magician David Copperfield, French conceptual artist Sophie Calle, rock singer Nina Hagen, and American photo artist William Wegman.

One almost feels as though one were being watched. Eyes are everywhere - beautiful, ugly, weird, weary, radiant. An encyclopedic and fantastic documentation of an organ of perception.

We hardly recognized them at first glance: neither David Copperfield nor Nina Hagen nor Christian Lacroix. Neither did we recognize Uschi Obermair, Rammstein, and Anton Corbijn. Who's responsible? Photographers Daniel & Geo Fuchs and their marvelously selective visual perception, that's who. These two artists set out to scrutinize the eyes of prominent artists, designers, musicians, architects, actors, and actresses.

They're two of the ho ttest names on the international photo scene: artist couple Daniel & Geo Fuchs were the talk of the town and the planet when they first unveiled their spectacularly gruesome shots of preserved creatures, which include specimens of the species called Homo sapiens. Somewhere among the conserved specimens in the medical institutions, the Fuchs duo must have discovered the Macro 5 SLR Polaroid camera. Their book (Famous Eyes) and its accompanying exhibition in Hamburg's Kunsthaus are the world premiere of their newest creation, in which they present extraordinary portraits of celebrities, artists, and other creative individuals.

Daniel and Geo Fuchs first achieved international recognition in the wake of their "Conserving" project. The exhibition of pictures of "sleeping" specimens preserved in alcohol was a triumph at Rencontres d'Arles in 2000. But this photographer couple was already hard at work on their next series of imag es, the results of which are now presented inside the slipcase of this blockbuster, pink-packaged volume. Famous Eyes is much more than merely a collection of Polaroid portraits of international artists, curators, photographers, and media people, nor have Daniel & Geo Fuchs merely invited individuals like René Burri, Greg Gorman, Peter Lindbergh, or Anton Corbijn to stand in front of their camera. Each photo results from a playful dialogue in which the legendary Polaroid instant photo plays a decisive role.

Artists, photographers, actors, actresses, and architects always view the world from a different perspective than the rest of the population. If that weren't so, then the results of their work would scarcely attract attention. That's why photo artists Geo and Daniel Fuchs thought that it would be interesting to take a closer look at the eyes of these creative individuals. They first began pointing the lens of a Polaroid camera i nto the eyes of prominent celebrities three years ago. Now the results of this project are collected in a photo book called Famous Eyes, which includes portraits of the eyes of nearly 200 creative people.

Following on the heels of their prizewinning, critically acclaimed, and internationally exhibited "Conserving" project, "Famous Eyes" is the latest exhibition and book project by Daniel & Geo Fuchs. It's an incomparable and unprecedented documentation of today's most famous creative personalities: artists, photographers, designers, makers of culture, musicians, actors, actresses, and architects.