Beyond the Canvas: A Deep Dive into the World of Louis Appleby, the Artist Shaping Contemporary Narratives

In the kaleidoscopic world of contemporary art, Louis Appleby stands out for his vivid use of color and emotive expression. This interview peels back the layers of his creative process, exploring the inspirations and aspirations of a truly visionary artist. Join us for a brief but deep dive into the mind and art of Louis Appleby, a name that encapsulates the vibrancy of modern creativity.


Can you describe the central themes and inspirations behind your current exhibition at Long Story Short in Paris?

This idea of some sort of journey through spoilt landscapes and clean interiors. I almost imagine a person, maybe myself or maybe a stranger, visiting these different spaces and having some sort of profound contemplation or realisation about the nature of existence & their world. Perhaps revisiting places of from their past to find them changed or filled with litter. 

Most of the paintings share common motifs of horizons, unatural neon sunsets, night skies & far away mountains. These could suggest a journey to a place, physical or metaphorical, that lies beyond the reach of the viewer. 

A lot of the paintings also include bottles or candles. I like the visual relationship between these two objects being cylindrical upright, seemingly simple objects, but once you really look at them you realise they’re actually very complicated. For example, the translucent of the bottles and the distortion that they create. Candles were very tricky to get right in the paintings, (maybe I still haven’t got them quite right) 

 they’re not as simple as a white cylinder- their waxy surface reflects a lot of light. They are ever so slightly translucent & whilst lit the top glows whilst the bottom fades into shadow. So trying to paint all of this convincingly was quite tricky. There was a point halfway through making this body of the work that I decided to have the candles and the bottles interact with each other via reflections of the flames. This was very exciting for me to paint & was really satisfying when it worked.

The idea to paint bottles first came from a day spent in the Lake District with my girlfriend. We’ve been to this same spot quite often to swim, relax and spend the day by the river. I had gone to grab a rock to use a platform to cook on, and underneath this rock Someone had dug a hole and filled it with old beer bottles and plastic crap.

Basically they were too lazy to take it back down with them. It got me wondering how many other rocks might have rubbish underneath them. That’s kind of how the idea of painting bottles came into the landscape paintings. That was the first painting in this made body of work to take form and it then informed a lot of the other paintings.

How does this exhibition reflect the evolution of your artistic style and approach ?


For me, it’s probably via new levels of detail that I’ve previously not explored- such as earlier mentioned reflections of on bottles or candles. I also included a lot of new motives that I’ve not painted before such as the knife and the fork, the dried flower poking out of the wine bottle & the bottles themselves.

I wanted to make some paintings that were more landscape based rather than paintings of interiors & still lifes. The interior still lifes do make a return but are entirely absent in some paintings.  I’ve also been less precious about these paintings, not less precious as in I don’t care about them, but less precious in terms of 

being more free with them and allowing ideas to happen quickly. Rather than thinking them over for weeks or talking myself out of ideas, I’ve been much more confident & quicker in making decisions. 

My work often takes a bit of planning and can be time consuming. This approach to Painting can have its problems because as more time is spent on the work, you can become more precious about taking risks. It’s awful when you try something & it doesn’t work. You feel like you’ve wasted hours of your life!

What are the challenges and rewards of showcasing your work in Paris, a city with such a rich artistic heritage ?


You have such incredible Galleries & museums in Paris. So it’s quite a privilege to have a show here. It’s my first time showing work to a French audience who I hope enjoyed seeing my paintings. The challenges were physically getting the work from England l, which was intense because I was scared something may go wrong with customs & the work wouldn’t make it to the gallery in time. But everything was fine in the end. We used a great shipping company to get the work here & the gallery was extremely helpful with assisting everything. 

I had quite a cool moment the morning after the show where myself and my younger brother were walking through the streets of Paris. A lot of places were closed as it was Sunday morning so we were aimlessly wondering around drinking coffee. we then realised that we were on the same street as the Gallery (my phone didn’t work all weekend so I had no Google maps). Walking past the Gallery and seeing my work that been in my studio in Lancaster North England for the last six months hung on the walls of the gallery in the middle of Paris was quite surreal.

Could you walk us through your creative process for developing the pieces featured in this exhibition ?

I rarely ever plan the end result of a painting & they usually just evolve over time. I might have a rough idea but it always changes. 

I always start with layers of colour which usually ends up being a sky. If the colours aren’t right, the entire direction of the Painting will be wrong for me. I can sometimes spend a  week or two  just layering different colours on top of each other till I’ve got it right. I try to reach for complex colours that only result from multiple layers of paint interacting with each other. 

In no particular order I’m scraping back, adding , wiping away with cloths, using Airbrush, thick brushes, big brushes, small brushes, glazes. I then like to add some sort of landscape- mountains, Hills or a cityscapes. I really like to set the scene before working out the final areas of the painting.

I really love paintings that play with light, space, depth and perspective which is something try to do in my work. My process is very similar fundamentally to collage or stencilling. The locations in my work don’t exist in real life. They are combination of different places. The objects are often copied from Google images. But sometimes I can’t find the right image so I will draw it myself. I use a mixture of both traditional brushes and an airbrush& work with acrylic paint on wood which is different to working on canvas. I always work in multiple paintings at once & build them all up over months of working on them. 

How do you see your work interacting with or contributing to contemporary art conversations ?

It’s quite a difficult question because I don’t really know how my work operates to other people.  maybe I’d like my work to be viewed through the same lens as still life paintings or landscape paintings. The art world is so vast and so varied & ever changing & evolving. but if I could just inspire a few people to paint that would be nice. 

Are there any particular artist or movements of influenced your work for the exhibition ? 

I’ve been making paintings of interiors for maybe 10 years now, or it’s taken me 10 years to get to this point. my entry point to the style of working was definitely, whilst studying at Wimbledon college of art, seeing some of David Hockney’s interior paintings where he’d painted every hair of carpet in the room.

A painting by Nicole Eisenman called Morning Studio- two figures embracing in front of a projection of a computer screen with a galaxy desktop wallpaper, & every folder & program icon painted. I was blown away at that level of detail they both went to & found it fascinating to see how they were painted.

Some other artists to include would be Dexter Dallwood, Emily Mae smith, David Rayson & John Stark. more recently, I’ve been loving the work of Friederich Kunath, Michael Canning & Sayre Gomez. There are too many amazing painters all working today to name! 

Looking ahead, are there any new directions or projects you are currently exploring ?

I’m currently working towards an exhibition in Hong Kong at shop house gallery. Its a two person show with friend & incredible artist Victor seaward. He makes really interesting 3-D printed objects & arrangements. They’re hard to describe so I would recommend taking a look. He was in the year above me studying Painting at the Royal College of art. I’m making 6 new paintings for this show & I’ll be visiting Hong Kong for the first time. I’m excited by the work I’m making at the moment, so things are looking good. 

Finally, what advice would you give to emerging artists who aspire to exhibit their work internationally ?

I can only speak from my experience which was go to art school & do an MA or equivalent, if you can. You can learn a lot there. If you can’t it’s not necessarily the end of the world. The degree show is a good opportunity for you to show work to a large audience & possibly galleries. Instagram is a good way to get your work out & discover other artists & galleries. Have a website & take professional pictures of your work & make PDF catalogs so you can send your work to those who are interested. 

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