[Aimee Ng, Curator]
Doron Langberg’s Lover engages with the 16th-century portrait by Holbein displayed nearby. Here’s the artist discussing how Holbein’s art inspires him and the themes he explores in his portrait.
[Doron Langberg, Artist]
Seeing a Holbein painting in person is an overwhelming experience.
The level of specificity and clarity is mind blowing.
In the portrait of Thomas More, the shimmery folds of velvet, the soft fur, and the stubble on his chin are so vivid he feels totally alive.
On first encounter I couldn’t really wrap my head around the paintings, and it was actually Holbein’s drawings that gave me access to his work.
More pared down but no less refined than the paintings, each element in the drawing—hair, garments, features—is handled differently, varying in material and even color.
It’s almost a collage sensibility.
This range of visual languages resonated with my own fascination with painting’s power to communicate the sensation of touch, both describing what a material might feel like through illusionistic rendering, and the literal touching of the surface during the painting process.
For me, there’s a clear relationship between this tactility and desire, where the painting and the act of looking itself takes on a sensual or erotic quality.
Being queer, the nature of this desire is not neutral and is sometimes seen as different or even less than.
Through all my work I try to challenge that idea, and in this piece—depicting an intimate domestic moment—I wanted to bring the viewer in through my use of paint and color and share with them a fundamental part of my experience of the world.
[Aimee Ng, Curator]
This installation is part of the series Living Histories: Queer Views and Old Masters, and will be on view until January 2022.