Louis Lisle is a contemporary artist based in Manchester. He specialises in vibrant abstract painting that expresses and explores his identity and emotions.
Photo Credits Lewis Scott and The Rafiki Gallery
Artist Statement
Painting offers me a methodology for understanding my sexual impulses, and the world of erotica. I enter a dialogue with the painted surface, where I am free to interrogate, explore, and express desire and emotion, unencumbered by the restraints of negatively prejudiced judgements. There is an immediacy of expression with paint and its application, that more closely matches my feelings on engaging with images of men and erotica. My ambition is to identify more closely, a visual examination of male homosexuality in image and sensation. And through this, to explore, to flourish and mature.
The resultant works are unique and creatively potent combination of pride, desire, secrecy and shame. Yes, the images that act as my source material are highly explicit and sometimes pornographic. I am not trying to shock the viewer, merely by purveying gaudy lustful images of porn. My intentions differ from the more provocative works of Mapplethorpe or Tom of Finland. Rather, I try to translate into pictorial form, emotions experienced when queer people see these images and later when they interact sexually. My work asks ‘How can a painting authoritatively depict feelings of sexual awakening and awareness ?’
Exhibitions
RSA New Contemporaries 2021/22- The Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh, February-March 2022 .
WARP with Short Supply - Islington Mill, Manchester, November 2021.
Abstract Zeitgeist, The Rafiki Gallery - The Biscuit Factory, Edinburgh, September 2021 .
Final, not Over- Again - Unit One Gallery London, June 2021.
.
