ARTICLE

The Dark Art of Ivan Albright
by Sean D. Francis

There are nearly as many ways to express the darkness in the worlds as there are types of darkness.  Ivan Albright chose painting and have given us many paintings from which to draw inspiration.  In some cases, the painting just sends chills down our spine without any real reason.

Flesh (Smaller than Tears Are the Little Blue Flowers), seen to the left, begins a view of Albright's work that clearly demonstrates his ability at capturing darkness in paint.   All his subjects are ugly.  This term isn't meant to be a judgment on what attractiveness or unattractivenes.  The painting itself is very attractive and tends to fascinate viewers to the point that they are examining every wrinkle in the skin, the fingernails, and the withered face. 

The viewer begins to come up with a story as to what is going on in this painting.  What was Albright trying to say?  Who is this person?  Is this a man or a woman?  Is that an eye for a nipple?    Is this about regret?

Albright was fascinated by the effects of time, the inevitable fading of luster from youth to age to death.  In the painting, Into the World There Came a Soul Called Ida, we can see an aged woman, sitting at a make-up stable staring vainly into a mirror.  Her youthful beauty has long left her.

Humanity struggling against the inevitable creates a tension that we all understand too well.  Even the most ardant supporter of free-will cannot deny that there is a fated end for us all.  Kings, beggers, fools, and bishops will all end up in the grave.  But in Albright's paintings we see the struggle to avoid the inevitable.  In looking at Into the World There Came a Soul Called Ida a viewer may cluck his or her tongue and laugh, "Yeah, right granny, make-up is going to make you look better!"  Yet, undoubtedly, there is a part of each of us who looks at her and feels our hearts ache, knowing this is our fate also.  She may be looking in the mirror, unsatisfied with the reflection of her present, but we look into the painting unsatisfied with the reflection of our future. 

Ivan Albright got a boost to his fame when MGM invited Albright to be the artist for Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray. It took him over a year to paint and the effect was magnificent.  In 1945, when the movie was released, the painting shocked audiences and instantly made Albright, the dark artist.  As you can see for yourself, the painting clearly showed the grotesqueness that Oscar Wilde truly wanted to create in his novel.

The lavish detail to the background must have been lost on the audience of the film, who never had a chance to study it.  The fact that it still left a memorable impression on them is amazing.

Albright didn't save his view of the inevitable for his subject matter.   In the painting, Self Portrait. he holds himself up to the mirror, displaying his own struggle against the tides of time.  Albright is a success story, an artist who delved deeply into the darkness of the human condition, and has been celebrated in many galleries around the globe.  Eventually, though, we too must pass through The Door.