About Ben Louria

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  A predominantly self taught painter originally from Michigan, with an Associates Degree in Visual Communications specializing in Illustration from the Colorado Institute of Art (now the Art Institute of Colorado). Having also attended the Arts Students League of New York studying Painting and Drawing.

 

  My painting work is largely illustrative in style, having been heavily influenced by the Low Brow or Pop Surrealism movements made famous by artists such as Robert Williams, Ron English and Todd Schorr. I created a word that sums up this style and that word is “Satirealism”. Illustrative realism in approach and handling of the medium, and satirical in subject matter. Humor and satire are the binding threads that tie my paintings together.  I have always drawn. I taught my self drawing by reading and collecting comic books mimicking the styles of artists like John Byrne and Frank Miller. 

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 In my early twenties, I spent six years as a US Navy Photographer and fell in love with the works of Sebastian Selgatto, Dorthea Lange, Henri Cartier-Bresson and Weegee.  I kept their photojournalist approach, and I love the ability to tell a story with an image. I still love to shoot and prefer to shoot with available light as I don't like the artificial feel I get from a flash, and I also prefer to be the "fly on the wall" and capture candids and not the "smile and say cheese" shot.

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