Pandainabattlesuit

I stumbled across this excellent artist when on my RSS, and one of my favourite sites featured his work.

Travis Louie is an amazing artist with a myth telling imagination to match. his art work not only captures the eye but also transports your imagination into a refine ‘tim burtonesqe’ world of myth and tale vs real life. I would be lying if I said I did not want one of his beautiful portraits of the infinitely curious Jelly fish lady on our wall at home.

I would indeed pretend the very interesting lady was a relative, one that we didn’t see very often but still made mail correspondence with, when she wasn’t travelling between realms. Much akin to a lemony snicketts theme. Maybe I thought about that for too long.

Sir Frederick, and of course his Leviathan. Of course. I like this picture a lot. I would put it in the hallway and have a very similar story to that of the Jelly fish lady. “Oh yeah, Fred and I are always ‘gallivanting’ about on his sea monster. Quite a good day out to be rest assured. To tell that story I would how ever have to put a slight British accent in place, and concurrently think about twisting my imagined handle br moustache.

Travis’ art carries a beautiful heavy story, and this is attributed to his influences.

[via Travislouie.com/about]

“The visual style of his work is mostly influenced by the lighting and atmosphere of German Expressionist and Film Noir motion pictures from the Silent Era to the late 1950’s. Films from directors like F W Murnau, Fritz Lang, Orson Welles, Robert Siodmak, Robert Aldrich, Jacque Tourneur, and cinematographer, Greg Toland, had a great effect on the way he wanted his paintings to look.

To achieve the dramatic “mood” in his paintings, they are produced primarily in black and white or limited color. He uses acrylic paints over tight graphite drawings on smooth grounds, like “plate” finish illustration board or finely sanded, primed wood panels. When he is not painting, his time is spent writing in his notebooks and journals. Many little drawings and sketches are made from those writings, most of which are less than 10 centimeters square.

The influences for his work are many; the genre films, his fascination with human oddities, circus sideshows, old Vaudeville magic acts, Victorian portraits, and things otherworldly, are all blended together to enable him to bring life to the characters and stories he writes in his journals.”

I really think that Travis’ art encompasses the adult imagination, that perhaps lives in a lot of business men and women’s’ back pocket, or their subconsciousness, perhaps subdued from childhood that is forgotten.

I would love to catch a gallery showing of his works. But in the time being I will settle for the digital version.

Please do yourself a favour, check out his website.