Philipp Keel
Encyclopedia
Philipp Keel is a Swiss artist and writer based in Zurich, Switzerland and Los Angeles, California
.
Keel achieved critical and popular acclaim after the best-selling All About Me, a book series with over three million copies in print. Central to his work are caricature, the beauty of details, light, and the complexity of the human mind. Noted for pioneering the Imbue Print technique, Keel received recognition in the art world with a solo show at Art Basel
in 2001. Two years later, Steidl Publishing released Color, the most comprehensive collection of his editions.
Keel draws inspiration from Keith Jarrett
's The Köln Concert
, palm trees, the short stories of Carson McCullers
, David Hockney
's Paper Pools, rabbits, and Coca-Cola
in the classic 237 ml glass bottle.
, Switzerland. His father is Daniel Keel, founder of Diogenes Verlag and his mother, Anna Keel, is a painter
and sculptor. Frequent guests in the Keel household included Patricia Highsmith
, Maurice Sendak
and Federico Fellini
, whom Philipp delighted in watching direct movies at Cinecittà
in Rome. At age nine, while in the hospital recovering from a near-fatal car accident, Keel decided he would become an artist
and film director
.
The younger of two sons, Keel, though lively and curious at home, was shy and inattentive at school. As early as kindergarten
, he found himself more captivated with toys and books than with games or lessons. Diane Arbus
’ photographs featured frequently in his imagination. When Keel was fourteen years old, he literally escaped from boarding school
in Gruyère
and used his birthday money to take a train to Paris. It was during this sojourn that he discovered a passion for photographing people and mysterious details, using a camera he found in a park. At the same time, Keel began to make drawings and caricatures inspired by the works of Tomi Ungerer
, Saul Steinberg
and Sempé.
in Boston
, Keel returned to Switzerland
to work for ad agency Ogilvy & Mather
, where he wrote campaigns for clients such as Ford, Pepsi
, and Polaroid
before going on to direct radio and television commercials
. At twenty-one, Keel founded his own advertising agency
in a tiny two-room apartment above a fish market and over the next few years used his earnings to develop his skills as an artist
.
In 1992 Keel moved to Minneapolis, where he met John Dunkley, a Native American of the Ojibwe Tribe. The two became friends, and Keel was inspired with the idea for a docudrama about a Swiss man who decides to explore living in the poorest county in the United States. Keel moved onto the Pine Ridge Reservation
in the Badlands
, South Dakota
. There, with the help of the Oglala Sioux, he completed the film under the influence of fluid morphine
, which had been prescribed for a dislocated shoulder he suffered during a basketball game at a local orphanage. Greetings From Pine Ridge marked his first directorial turn.
That autumn, Keel started studying at University of Television and Film
(formerly: HFF), Munich
. Upon graduation three years later, Keel moved to Los Angeles
. The city, in the aftermath of the Rodney King riots and the Northridge earthquake
, was cheap and relatively empty. Keel wrote a few scripts and continued making art, but soon found himself overwhelmed and broke. Inspired by his observation that the privilege of talking about oneself seems to be reserved for famous people, Keel wrote All About Me, a candid questionnaire in twenty-five chapters about life and love, designed to help readers deepen their understanding of themselves. With over three million copies in print worldwide, other books in the All About series include All About Us, and All About Me – The Teenage Edition.
Keel dedicated the next decade to his art. During this period, Keel’s paintings and photography were exhibited in established galleries and museums throughout Europe and the United States. Speaking in an interview about his greatest influences he said, “As strange as it might seem, most of my inspiration comes from Los Angeles. You may find its irony, sadness, its absurd beauty and childish naïveté in my entire body of work. Here is where I think I will always create something new again and force myself to overcome the fear of trying something that I would be afraid of exploring in other hemispheres.”
It was only after relocating to California
that Keel started photographing in color, and that he discovered painting and printmaking. He collaborated with Don Weinstein, a printer who has worked with artists like Annie Leibovitz
, Richard Avedon
, and Helmut Newton
, and who invited him to experiment with archival inks. A solo show at the Galerie zur Stockeregg marked Keel as the first artist to exhibit large-scale Imbue Prints. In a move toward closure with a chapter of his career, Keel undertook the task of editing and cataloging his entire black-and-white photography archives. The result was his first art publication, Look At Me. His next art book, Color,Keel, P. (2003) Color. Steidl. ISBN 3-88243-865-7 was released three years later, followed by AISA – Images from an Imaginary Continent in 2005.
His most recent publication, Keel’s Simple Diary, “challenges the constant barrage of information, the struggle of needing to do more while having time for less, and the wonderful demands of modern life.” The books provide amusing and philosophical insights into the world and the human mind, prompting the reader to contribute their own thoughts. Simple Diary is Taschen’s first publication primarily filled with text.
Keel’s current focus is visual art and film
. Keel rejects what he refers to as “cynicism in the contemporary art world” and has reservations about work that is overly political. "When style and light meet, there is art. Art doesn't need to be invented, art is what has already been set up. It is not an artist's responsibility to capture what is there, it should be an artist's challenge to exaggerate or diminish what already exists."Keel, P. (2003) Color, pp 8. Steidl. ISBN 3-88243-865-7
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
.
Keel achieved critical and popular acclaim after the best-selling All About Me, a book series with over three million copies in print. Central to his work are caricature, the beauty of details, light, and the complexity of the human mind. Noted for pioneering the Imbue Print technique, Keel received recognition in the art world with a solo show at Art Basel
Art Basel
Art Basel is an international contemporary art fair held each June in Basel, Switzerland. Similar to the Venice Biennale, it has been called "the Olympics of the art world". Art Basel features nearly 300 leading galleries from North America, Latin America, Europe, Asia and Africa...
in 2001. Two years later, Steidl Publishing released Color, the most comprehensive collection of his editions.
Keel draws inspiration from Keith Jarrett
Keith Jarrett
Keith Jarrett is an American pianist and composer who performs both jazz and classical music.Jarrett started his career with Art Blakey, moving on to play with Charles Lloyd and Miles Davis. Since the early 1970s he has enjoyed a great deal of success in jazz, jazz fusion, and classical music; as...
's The Köln Concert
The Köln Concert
The Köln Concert is a recording by the pianist Keith Jarrett of solo piano improvisations performed at the Cologne Opera House in Cologne on January 24, 1975 before a live audience...
, palm trees, the short stories of Carson McCullers
Carson McCullers
Carson McCullers was an American writer. She wrote novels, short stories, and two plays, as well as essays and some poetry. Her first novel The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter explores the spiritual isolation of misfits and outcasts of the South...
, David Hockney
David Hockney
David Hockney, CH, RA, is an English painter, draughtsman, printmaker, stage designer and photographer, who is based in Bridlington, Yorkshire and Kensington, London....
's Paper Pools, rabbits, and Coca-Cola
Coke bottle styling
Coke bottle styling is a term used to describe any automotive body styling bearing an overall body shape resembling the classic glass Coca-Cola soft drink's contour bottle design. It is a style of automobile bodies with outward curving fenders with a narrow center. In contrast to "straight-edge"...
in the classic 237 ml glass bottle.
Early years
Philipp Keel was born and grew up in ZürichZürich
Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is located in central Switzerland at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich...
, Switzerland. His father is Daniel Keel, founder of Diogenes Verlag and his mother, Anna Keel, is a painter
Painting
Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...
and sculptor. Frequent guests in the Keel household included Patricia Highsmith
Patricia Highsmith
Patricia Highsmith was an American novelist and short-story writer most widely known for her psychological thrillers, which led to more than two dozen film adaptations. Her first novel, Strangers on a Train, has been adapted for stage and screen numerous times, notably by Alfred Hitchcock in 1951...
, Maurice Sendak
Maurice Sendak
Maurice Bernard Sendak is an American writer and illustrator of children's literature. He is best known for his book Where the Wild Things Are, published in 1963.-Early life:...
and Federico Fellini
Federico Fellini
Federico Fellini, Cavaliere di Gran Croce OMRI , was an Italian film director and scriptwriter. Known for a distinct style that blends fantasy and baroque images, he is considered one of the most influential and widely revered filmmakers of the 20th century...
, whom Philipp delighted in watching direct movies at Cinecittà
Cinecittà
Cinecittà is a large film studio in Rome that is considered the hub of Italian cinema.-History:The studios were founded in 1937 by Benito Mussolini and his head of cinema Luigi Freddi for propaganda purposes, under the slogan "Il cinema è l'arma più forte"...
in Rome. At age nine, while in the hospital recovering from a near-fatal car accident, Keel decided he would become an artist
Artist
An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...
and film director
Film director
A film director is a person who directs the actors and film crew in filmmaking. They control a film's artistic and dramatic nathan roach, while guiding the technical crew and actors.-Responsibilities:...
.
The younger of two sons, Keel, though lively and curious at home, was shy and inattentive at school. As early as kindergarten
Kindergarten
A kindergarten is a preschool educational institution for children. The term was created by Friedrich Fröbel for the play and activity institute that he created in 1837 in Bad Blankenburg as a social experience for children for their transition from home to school...
, he found himself more captivated with toys and books than with games or lessons. Diane Arbus
Diane Arbus
Diane Arbus March 14, 1923 – July 26, 1971) was an American photographer and writer noted for black-and-white square photographs of "deviant and marginal people or of people whose normality seems ugly or surreal." A friend said that Arbus said that she was "afraid.....
’ photographs featured frequently in his imagination. When Keel was fourteen years old, he literally escaped from boarding school
Boarding school
A boarding school is a school where some or all pupils study and live during the school year with their fellow students and possibly teachers and/or administrators. The word 'boarding' is used in the sense of "bed and board," i.e., lodging and meals...
in Gruyère
Gruyère (district)
Gruyère District is a district of the canton of Fribourg in Switzerland. It has a population of . Its capital is Bulle.-Municipalities:-Mergers and name changes:...
and used his birthday money to take a train to Paris. It was during this sojourn that he discovered a passion for photographing people and mysterious details, using a camera he found in a park. At the same time, Keel began to make drawings and caricatures inspired by the works of Tomi Ungerer
Tomi Ungerer
Jean-Thomas "Tomi" Ungerer is a French illustrator best known for his erotic and political illustrations as well as children's books.- Biography :...
, Saul Steinberg
Saul Steinberg
Saul Steinberg was a Romanian-born American cartoonist and illustrator, best known for his work for The New Yorker.-Biography:...
and Sempé.
Career
After studying improvisational piano at Berklee College of MusicBerklee College of Music
Berklee College of Music, located in Boston, Massachusetts, is the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. Known primarily as a school for jazz, rock and popular music, it also offers college-level courses in a wide range of contemporary and historic styles, including hip...
in Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
, Keel returned to Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
to work for ad agency Ogilvy & Mather
Ogilvy & Mather
Ogilvy & Mather is an international advertising, marketing and public relations agency based in Manhattan and owned by the WPP Group. The company operates 497 offices in 125 countries with approximately 16,000 employees.-History:...
, where he wrote campaigns for clients such as Ford, Pepsi
Pepsi
Pepsi is a carbonated soft drink that is produced and manufactured by PepsiCo...
, and Polaroid
Polaroid Corporation
Polaroid Corporation is an American-based international consumer electronics and eyewear company, originally founded in 1937 by Edwin H. Land. It is most famous for its instant film cameras, which reached the market in 1948, and continued to be the company's flagship product line until the February...
before going on to direct radio and television commercials
Television advertisement
A television advertisement or television commercial, often just commercial, advert, ad, or ad-film – is a span of television programming produced and paid for by an organization that conveys a message, typically one intended to market a product...
. At twenty-one, Keel founded his own advertising agency
Advertising agency
An advertising agency or ad agency is a service business dedicated to creating, planning and handling advertising for its clients. An ad agency is independent from the client and provides an outside point of view to the effort of selling the client's products or services...
in a tiny two-room apartment above a fish market and over the next few years used his earnings to develop his skills as an artist
Artist
An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...
.
In 1992 Keel moved to Minneapolis, where he met John Dunkley, a Native American of the Ojibwe Tribe. The two became friends, and Keel was inspired with the idea for a docudrama about a Swiss man who decides to explore living in the poorest county in the United States. Keel moved onto the Pine Ridge Reservation
Pine Ridge Indian Reservation
The Pine Ridge Indian Reservation is an Oglala Sioux Native American reservation located in the U.S. state of South Dakota. Originally included within the territory of the Great Sioux Reservation, Pine Ridge was established in 1889 in the southwest corner of South Dakota on the Nebraska border...
in the Badlands
Badlands
A badlands is a type of dry terrain where softer sedimentary rocks and clay-rich soils have been extensively eroded by wind and water. It can resemble malpaís, a terrain of volcanic rock. Canyons, ravines, gullies, hoodoos and other such geological forms are common in badlands. They are often...
, South Dakota
South Dakota
South Dakota is a state located in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is named after the Lakota and Dakota Sioux American Indian tribes. Once a part of Dakota Territory, South Dakota became a state on November 2, 1889. The state has an area of and an estimated population of just over...
. There, with the help of the Oglala Sioux, he completed the film under the influence of fluid morphine
Morphine
Morphine is a potent opiate analgesic medication and is considered to be the prototypical opioid. It was first isolated in 1804 by Friedrich Sertürner, first distributed by same in 1817, and first commercially sold by Merck in 1827, which at the time was a single small chemists' shop. It was more...
, which had been prescribed for a dislocated shoulder he suffered during a basketball game at a local orphanage. Greetings From Pine Ridge marked his first directorial turn.
That autumn, Keel started studying at University of Television and Film
University of Television and Film Munich
The University of Television and Film Munich is a publicly funded film school in Munich, Germany. The school was established in 1966 by decree of the Bavarian government. The University of Television and Film Munich is one of Germany's most reputable film schools with about 350 students enrolled...
(formerly: HFF), Munich
Munich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...
. Upon graduation three years later, Keel moved to Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
. The city, in the aftermath of the Rodney King riots and the Northridge earthquake
Northridge earthquake
The Northridge earthquake was a massive earthquake that occurred on January 17, 1994, at 04:31 Pacific Standard Time in Reseda, a neighborhood in the city of Los Angeles, California, lasting for about 10–20 seconds...
, was cheap and relatively empty. Keel wrote a few scripts and continued making art, but soon found himself overwhelmed and broke. Inspired by his observation that the privilege of talking about oneself seems to be reserved for famous people, Keel wrote All About Me, a candid questionnaire in twenty-five chapters about life and love, designed to help readers deepen their understanding of themselves. With over three million copies in print worldwide, other books in the All About series include All About Us, and All About Me – The Teenage Edition.
Keel dedicated the next decade to his art. During this period, Keel’s paintings and photography were exhibited in established galleries and museums throughout Europe and the United States. Speaking in an interview about his greatest influences he said, “As strange as it might seem, most of my inspiration comes from Los Angeles. You may find its irony, sadness, its absurd beauty and childish naïveté in my entire body of work. Here is where I think I will always create something new again and force myself to overcome the fear of trying something that I would be afraid of exploring in other hemispheres.”
It was only after relocating to California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
that Keel started photographing in color, and that he discovered painting and printmaking. He collaborated with Don Weinstein, a printer who has worked with artists like Annie Leibovitz
Annie Leibovitz
Anna-Lou "Annie" Leibovitz is an American portrait photographer.-Early life and education:Born in Waterbury, Connecticut, Leibovitz is the third of six children. She is a third-generation American whose great-grandparents were Jewish immigrants, from Central and Eastern Europe. Her father's...
, Richard Avedon
Richard Avedon
Richard Avedon was an American photographer. An obituary published in The New York Times said that "his fashion and portrait photographs helped define America's image of style, beauty and culture for the last half-century."-Photography career:Avedon was born in New York City to a Jewish Russian...
, and Helmut Newton
Helmut Newton
Helmut Newton, born Helmut Neustädter was a German-Australian photographer. He was a "prolific, widely imitated fashion photographer whose provocative, erotically charged black-and-white photos were a mainstay of Vogue and other publications."-Early life:Newton was born in Berlin, the son of Klara...
, and who invited him to experiment with archival inks. A solo show at the Galerie zur Stockeregg marked Keel as the first artist to exhibit large-scale Imbue Prints. In a move toward closure with a chapter of his career, Keel undertook the task of editing and cataloging his entire black-and-white photography archives. The result was his first art publication, Look At Me. His next art book, Color,Keel, P. (2003) Color. Steidl. ISBN 3-88243-865-7 was released three years later, followed by AISA – Images from an Imaginary Continent in 2005.
His most recent publication, Keel’s Simple Diary, “challenges the constant barrage of information, the struggle of needing to do more while having time for less, and the wonderful demands of modern life.” The books provide amusing and philosophical insights into the world and the human mind, prompting the reader to contribute their own thoughts. Simple Diary is Taschen’s first publication primarily filled with text.
Keel’s current focus is visual art and film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
. Keel rejects what he refers to as “cynicism in the contemporary art world” and has reservations about work that is overly political. "When style and light meet, there is art. Art doesn't need to be invented, art is what has already been set up. It is not an artist's responsibility to capture what is there, it should be an artist's challenge to exaggerate or diminish what already exists."Keel, P. (2003) Color, pp 8. Steidl. ISBN 3-88243-865-7
Other references
- Neue Zürcher Zeitung, May 17, 2005, Page 36, Section: Zürcher Kultur, Title: Wie wirklich ist die Wirklichkeit?
- NZZ am Sonntag, May 2, 2004, Page 71, Title: Die Welt in Farbe und mit Register
- Süddeutsche Zeitung, March 5, 2004, Page 16, Section: Literatur, Title: Ein Fäustchen für ein Hallelujah
- SonntagsZeitung, June 10, 2001, Page 107, Section: Trend, Title: Ich habe vor Freude aufs Lenkrad getrommelt
- St. Galler Tagblatt, November 5, 2000, Page 24, Section: N/A, Title: Fragen, weil Antworten nicht mehr gefragt sind
- SonntagsZeitung, March 19, 2000, Page 115, Section: Trend, Title: Jungster Philipp Keel: Der Herr der Fragen
- Tages-Anzeiger, November 13, 1999, Page 71, Section: Savoir Vivre, Title: Fragespiel mit ungewissem Ausgang