Ink on canvas
22 × 25 in
Louis’ Blind paintings start with blind contour drawing, an exercise designed to hone focus and observation skills. He borrows this common process to create self-portraits, depictions of the landscape, and everyday objects.
His distinct technique starts with the blind contour drawing done in situ. He later transfers the drawing onto an unprimed canvas where he applies water-based inks within the negative spaces of the drawn lines. As the ink slowly begins to dry it recedes into the canvas creating brightly dyed shapes that sometimes flow in and out of one another. The result of this process is a series of cursory stains that create a distorted representation of Louis’ original subject.
In defying the borders between representation and conceptual perception, The Blind paintings go back to a lineage of meta message in the arts, from Magritte’s The Treachery of Images, to Kosuth’s One and Three Chairs. By sometimes using himself, or his likeness, as the catalyst of these creations, Louis goes one step further and integrates a contemporary attitude to explore even deeper into the waters of self-perception.
Read More: Gregg Louis’s Rorschach-like Paintings Challenge Memory and Perception
Blind 31, 2017Ink on canvas
36 × 36 in
Blind 34 (Cartagena), 2017Ink on canvas
60 × 48 in
Blind 54 (Sea of Cortez), 2017Ink on canvas
48 × 36 in
Blind 4 (Self Portrait), 2015
Ink on canvas
12 × 10 in
Blind 46 (Yucca Valley), 2017 Ink on canvas
14 × 9 in
Blind 45 (POTUS), 2018
Ink on canvas
38 × 24 in
Blind 49 (detail), 2016
Ink on canvas