Patrick Angus
The young American artist Patrick Angus was called The
Toulouse-Lautrec of Times Square by dramatist Robert
Patrick. What Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was at the end of the
19th century with his direct and unvarnished depictions of the
Parisian nightlife around the Montmartre, is Angus with his
depictions of the gay underground scene for the New York of
the 1980s. At a time when especially in the USA abstract and
particularly minimalistic art was predominate Patrick Angus,
born in 1953 in North-Hollywood, turned to figurative
painting. His paintings and drawings range from portraits,
city- and landscapes to depictions of the gay underground
milieu with its stripshows, bars and bathhouses that he
shows with a high sensibility. The unadorned scenes of
figures and situations of this milieu unifies his work
thematically with the work of the French painter with his
depictions of his demimonde one century earlier.
At the age of 20 Angus got a book of drawings by David
Hockney from his art teacher and was instantly fascinated by
his depictions of the „good and beautiful“ gay life in Los
Angeles. Attracted by this gleaming world, he travelled to Los
Angeles in 1975, looking for the world presented in Hockney’s
paintings. But resignedly he had to realise that this life
doesn‘t exist for people of his income bracket, unless of
course they are beautiful and rich. After his emigration to the
east cost, this insight, further refusals and the resultantly
emerging low self-confidence let him become a passive
observer and at the same time active visitor of habitués of
gay venues like stripshows and bathhouses. Such places
satisfied his desire, but at the same time increased his low
self-confidence. With a high pictorial quality, Angus shows
the tragedy of lonely hearts, of men who are trying to help
each other to get over the fact that they can‘t find what they
are looking for - love. With his compositions and his use of
light and expressive colour he catches the atmosphere
of underground art scenes and goes further than just
showing sexual abandon. The search for love and
appreciation, a social topic that has bothered many writers
and artists throughout time, is often Patrick Angus‘ subject.
He mediates this longing with the viewer, independent from
his/her sexual orientation or the subject of the painting, by
making this longing visible in his figures. This ancient longing
is timeless, especially today, in times of Internet.
Dandy Quentin Crisp described Angus’ paintings
as deliberately shameless. This common misreading
of them is probably one of the reasons why his works were
refused by gallery owners. Fear of rejection led to an
abandonment of all his hopes of recognition as a
serious artist, as opposed to pornographer, but he continued
painting furiously while living in direst poverty. Patrick Angus
showed the gay world he lived in. He said: Twenty three
years after Stonewall, gay people still have few honest
images of themselves, and most of those occur in our
literature. Gay men long to see themselves - in films, plays,
television, paintings. They seldom do. Obviously, we must
picture ourselves. These are my pictures.
Despite the carnality of the dark scenes, Angus‘ paintings
radiate sympathy and compassion for his
subjects, through their sober miens contrasted with vibrant
colours. Some paintings have titles from famous disco music,
chosen by the dancers for their strip tease to naked dances.
Some ironically express poignancy, as with “I’m only
human”, “boys do fall in love”, “remember the promise you
made”, etc., sung by super stars such as Diana Ross, Queen,
Bobby Brown, Grace Jones.
With their composition, colour and masterful depictions of
gesture and body language, these paintings are the work of a
master of great skill and high aesthetic sensibilities. Inspired
by a big Picasso retrospective in 1980 at the MoMA, he made
it his duty to search inspiration for his paintings not in other
art but in life. Observations and experiences he made in the
gay underground scene in New York during the 1980s
became the subject and content of his paintings. Also his
portraits of friends and his cityscapes and landscapes reveal
his virtuosity and mastery of the principles of the great
traditions of painting. With his distinctive observation skills
Angus manages not only to show the objective visibility of the
subjects but to creates a private, intimate atmosphere
through the details of living spaces like bedrooms and living
rooms. We see real people, vulnerable among their
possessions. These paintings are in the great tradition of
American social-realism, akin to the work of James Whistler,
Thomas Eakins, Edward Hopper. Angus’ deserted landscapes
compare with Hopper’s bleak scenes of urban life. With
Hopper, Angus shares deep compassion for the loneliness
of modern man. This loneliness and the efforts to compensate
for it, play a very important role in Angus‘ oeuvre.
Since he was diagnosed with the AIDS virus more than death
Patrick Angus feared his work would disappear with him. But
in the months before his death in 1992 his work gained some
recognition after all: a book of his paintings was published
and several solo-exhibitions were devoted to him. His name
has begun to take its place in art history. His works are now
shown in museums and he is represented in Phaidon’s new
art reference book „Art and Queer Culture“. To a wider public
he became known through the movie „An Englishman in New
York“ from 2009. The film dramatizes how Quentin Crisp
befriended and encouraged the young artist, with many of his
paintings shown on the big screen. Although the relevance of
his work is recognized by now, the full potential of his oeuvre
is far from being exhausted.
(Text by Tobias Bednarz)
Exhibitions
2015
"Patrick Angus", Galerie Thomas Fuchs, Stuttgart, DE (E)
2012
"Two Loves", Kymara Gallery, Biddeford, Maine, USA (G)
2010
"Celebration: Stepping Boldly into the Future", Leslie Lohman
Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art, New York, USA (G)
2006
"Sexwork: Kunst Mythos Realität", Neue Gesellschaft für
Bildende Kunst (NGBK), Berlin, DE (G)
2004
"Slave To The Rhythm", Leslie Lohman Gay Art Foundation,
New York, USA (E)
2002
"Warhol Explicitly Queer", Leslie Lohman Gay Art Foundation,
New York, USA (G)
2000
"10th Anniversary Exhibition", Leslie Lohman Museum of Gay
and Lesbian Art, New York, USA (G)
1997
"100 Jahre Schwulenbewegung", Eine Ausstellung des
Schwulen Museums und der Akademie der Künste, Berlin, DE
(G)
1995-1996
"Meant to be seen, A Momorial Exhibition of Works by Patrick
Angus, Eujens and Marc Lida", 24 Hours For Life Gallery, New
York, USA (G)
1995
"Phallic Symbols: Images in Contemporary Art", 24 Hours For
Life Gallery, New York, USA (G)
1994
"Diamonds, Gold And Myrrh: 25 Years", Leslie Lohman Gay
Art Foundation, New York, USA (G)
1993-1994
"The Female Nude", Leslie Lohman Gay Art Foundation, New
York, USA (E)
"Art and Fantasy", Amos Enos Gallery, New York, USA (G)
1993
"Gay Art in America", Leslie Lohman Gay Art Foundation, New
York, USA (G)
1992
"Major Works", John Pence Gallery, San Francisco, USA (G)
"Sexual Preference Visual Voices", Triplex Gallery, New York,
USA (G)
"Summer Group Exhibition", Leslie Lohman Gay Art
Foundation, New York, USA (G)
"Patrick Angus: Strip Show", Leslie Lohman Gay Art
Foundation, New York, USA (E)
"The Figure: Painting and Sculpture", John Pence Gallery, San
Francisco, USA (G)
"The New York Experience: Paintings by Patrick Angus",
Ganymed Gallery, New York, USA (E)
"Patrick Angus: Paintings and Drawings", College of Creative
Studies Gallery, University of California Santa Barbara, USA
(E)
(G) Gruppenausstellung, (E) Einzelausstellung