Organized by writer and curator Helen Molesworth, Face to Face: Portraits of Artists by Tacita Dean, Brigitte Lacombe and Catherine Opie presents portraits of luminaries in the arts by three portraitists of our time. 

Tacita Dean creates films that are studies of time and everyday life as it unfolds before the camera. Notably, she has produced a series of portraits of older artists, including Cy Twombly, Mario Merz, and Merce Cunningham. On view in Face to Face, Dean’s 16-minute film Portraits (2016) captures the artist David Hockney’s approach to art in his Los Angeles studio. The film opens with a shot of the artist standing with his back to the camera, smoking and reading a book. Watching him read and smoke, the viewer is witness to the artist’s working process, appreciating the small moments that make up an artist’s practice.

In contrast, Dean’s One Hundred and Fifty Years of Painting (2021) records a conversation between the 99-year-old painter Luchita Hurtado and the 49-year-old artist Julie Mehretu. who in 2020 would have shared a birthday exactly five decades apart; their combined ages inspire the film’s title.