Louise Leathers

Louise Leathers
North Hollywood, California, USA

STATEMENT

I think of my work as a way to empower silent figures. Through analog collages, I hijack august representations to free them from the patriarchy they suffer and involuntarily transmit to us. The image is usually a woman painted by a male artist which allows me to not only change her narrative but also to reclaim the piece, continuing a movement of refeminization of art history started by Sherrie Levine or Mary Beth Edelson before me. Religious magazines are one of my main sources of material as I see every religion as a potential system of oppression. Proudly blasphemous, the result is often more joyful and lustful than the original. My art also often takes a critical view of social, political, and cultural topics, resonating with contemporary issues and the never-ending news cycle familiar to the viewer. The piece becomes therefore cathartic for me, the represented figure, and the audience.

BIO

Louise Leathers is a French-born artist who lives and works in Los Angeles. She obtained a Master’s in Art History from the University of Paul Valéry Montpellier III in 2012. She began her career as a museum professional in Paris but it is only in 2016 that she started her own practice with collages. She took pieces of classic paintings she studied and worked with for many years to create feminist analog pieces. Influenced by artists like Sherrie Levine or the Guerrilla Girls she wants to be part of a movement for the refeminization of art history. In 2017, she moved to Los Angeles and found a new source of imagery in plentiful religious magazines. Growing up Catholic, Louise Leathers saw this religion as a system of oppression since childhood but the internal American fight with the temptation of theocracy only comforted her in her radical anti-religious views. She started therefore to create new provocative and Blasphemous series freeing her characters from the dogma. The “Mary” series thus depicts scenes of the Nativity where Jesus becomes piles of sex toys and contraceptives of all kinds. Her work can now be found in private collections in Europe.

ARTIST CONTACT

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IMAGES