Andrew Lakey Rediscovers Art Through His Painting Cycle “Studies and Paintings”

Born 1959 Chateauroux, France - Andrew Lakey is a painter, focusing on original works which includes Angels, Portraits, Hearts, Butterflies, Language, and flora and fauna color studies titled "Brilliant Nature" or, as this cycle is collectively called, "Unencountered."

Over two decades, he has produced thousands of paintings, sculptures, and drawings. In 1999, Lakey began to suffer chronic health issues from overexposure to toxins in paint, resulting in multiple and ongoing surgeries, and took a hiatus from his painting while focusing upon other outlets developing the "Unencountered" characters, including books of abstract art-poems. He still continues to paint, but wears protective gear for health reasons. Other projects that will take him out of the studio soon will include sculpture, drawing and producing films.

In 2010 Andrew Lakey has now begun a seminal endeavor - a new, two-stage painting cycle in his studio. The cycle consists of Studies, the preparatory work which is his current focus, and Paintings, the eventual art works that will result from his Studies.

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CVA: The Studies and Paintings series is a departure from the immensely detailed work in your previous projects. What is the back story of this project – how did it come about?

Andrew Lakey: The textured paintings I’ve been doing since 1990 are detailed and require me to use my hands to squeeze paint through tubes. This technique takes a very steady hand. Over the last few years my hands began to shake a little bit. I steadied my hand by using the other hand to support my wrist and hand area while applying the textures this way.

My doctor noticed my hand shaking during a routine office visit and asked me to see a neurologist. To make a long story short, I saw 4 neurologists, who confirmed I have tremors. Though I’ve been on tremor medication for this now for three years, I had to figure out a way to continue to create art as I hope to get off this medication one day. I wasn’t able to continue creating art at the same prolific level as I had in the past, squeezing paints from tubes to produce the texture was becoming increasingly difficult.

The ‘Studies and Paintings’ is a brand new project and I feel like I’ve started all over. At first it felt like I didn’t know how to create art any other way than I had in the past, so instead I thought I’d create Studies – meaning practice paintings; Study #1, Study #2, Study #3, and so on.

Eventually when I became comfortable with the new technique, I began to create Paintings from those “practice” Studies that I’d completed. That’s why I’ve numbered each Study. In the past when I created a study for other art projects, I recycled them. This time I decided to keep all of the Studies as a record to monitor what I was doing, and see if I could come up with a brand new technique that would work for my situation.

CVA: What, for you, signals the main difference – i.e., the jumping-off point – between creating a "Study" and a "Painting"?

Lakey: There’re a couple of differences. It was very hard to break free. In the past when I created my ‘textured’ work, if one little texture was out of place in a painting of thousands of lines nobody would notice but me. I would scrape that texture out and re-do it. The difference between the Studies and the textured work is that I decided in my mind to let it all go, to be more free – to not worry or need to feel comfortable with what I’m creating – just to create the Study to see what transpires, and flows from my hands.

I create these Studies painting with my fingers, because my hands shake too much any other way. But also, by using my fingers, I can’t control the paint like I did in the past. So, as I create my Studies, one key difference is that I don’t worry about ‘the feeling’. When I create the Painting, however, I take more time and I focus on the practice studies that I’ve done. Though I can’t create the textured work that much, I try to evoke that same feeling with the Paintings by focusing on what I’ve learned from doing the Studies.

So the Studies are free and the Paintings are somewhat more controlled. This is the process I’m in the midst of learning about, with the ‘Studies and Paintings’ project.

CVA: What would you like to communicate with these newest works?

Lakey: Well - at the present time, I’m not trying to communicate anything. I am trying to figure out the relationship between shape, color and material.

After all these years of painting, I’m fascinated with looking at so many artists’ work and seeing how the relationship between shapes and colors shows up in the artwork. It’s amazing, the spectrum I see out there so I decided to experiment with shapes and colors almost exclusively for now. I’m using colors I’ve never used in the past, and shapes that come intuitively to me; combining them together to see what feeling is there.

CVA: So you’re not “steering” this project anywhere yet, but where would you like to see the Studies and Paintings project go?

Lakey: Eventually, I’d like to create a body of work and have a showing for these in the future. It’s been almost twelve years since I’ve had any shows due to these health challenges. Perhaps this project could change some of that since the technique provides less pressure and stress on my hands. Saying that, I feel I could create a body of work one day that may give me an opportunity to show the work publicly.

I have to try and re-invent myself, if I’m to continue as an artist with the Studies and Paintings, and I'm starting to get connected to the art because my fingers touch the canvas directly, instead of using mechanical tools to apply the paint onto the surface.

This particular project reminds me a little of when I was a child in Kindergarten doing finger paintings. It almost takes me back to when I was that child, and it’s been great therapy for my hands. Maybe I could have a workshop one day, where people could participate in a collaborative project of creating art with our fingers.

To date I’ve created approximately 40 Studies. The Paintings are also numbered Painting No.1, Painting No.2, and so forth. Once I finish more Paintings, I will go back and create more Studies to see how far I can take this project. The ultimate goal for me is to create very large Paintings - 6’ x 6’, 8’ x 8’ and 10’ x 10’. For now the Studies and Paintings are created on a slightly smaller scale.

CVA: Any last thoughts about the Studies and Paintings project?

Lakey: If not my favorite project, it’s certainly one of them. I feel that I can let loose and just make a mess and see what happens.

As I work on the mess – shapes and forms come together. And it’s just wonderful to explore something that I’ve never done before.

Going back many years ago – it took me years and years to figure out the final technique for my texture process. Here I feel I’m on a new journey and I’m looking forward to the future to see how this period unfolds.

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For more, read the full-length interview, unedited, at:

http://people.southwestern.edu/~prevots/andrew-lakey-interview.html

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For more information about Andrew Lakey and his "Studies & Paintings" cycle, please visit:

http://www.andrewlakey.com

http://www.andrewlakeystudies.com

http://www.cvagallery.com