Michael R. Leon

Region: Pacific Coast

Website: http://michaelleon.ml

City / State: Fountain Valley, CA

My recent body of work concerns the idea of what might lie between or beyond irony and sincerity. It seems that in our present culture, irony has become no more than a screwball body wash advertisement, and sincerity a pet adoption commercial meant to guilt trip you into catharsis. Just as these ideas have been prominent in society and popular culture, they have become a recurring theme in contemporary painting.

I have addressed the question using personal narratives, family stories, and the conversations of passersby. I am interested in the structuring of stories and the restructuring that takes place as they are retold. My paintings manifest these ideas by providing a disjunctive narrative in which myths and anecdotes reflect the dysfunctional harmony of beauty and brutality in the everyday.