Meet Charlie Leal

Today we’d like to introduce you to Charlie Leal. They and their team shared their story with us below:

Contemporary Abstract Artist Charlie Leal grew up in Santa Cruz, California. As a boy, riding his skateboard along West Cliff Drive, listened to punk rock-reggae emanating from cars that dotted the shoreline and tracked sand from his wetsuit into his parents’ house. In Santa Cruz, the marine layer of fog rolls in every afternoon and creates a mysterious atmosphere that permeates everything. It is both the paradise and the melancholy that attracted Hollywood to make the iconic vampire coming-of-age flick The Lost Boys there.

“It’s the quilt that pulls itself over the town every day.” Charlie said of the fog.

This duality of dark and light has permeated Charlie’s work since he became a permanent fixture in Katie Harper’s Art Class at Santa Cruz High School. That’s where he developed a love for making imagery and capturing memories through his Art.

Charlie attended Art Center College of Design in Pasadena in 1991, earning his BFA degree in Illustration and Fine Art. There, he was immersed in the inspiration of his teacher/mentors Lawrence Carroll, Dwight Harmon, Richard Bunkall, Vern Wilson, Burne Hogarth and Steve Huston.

Shortly after graduating, Charlie found himself working on the set of David Bowie’s video Heart’s Filthy Lesson directed by Samuel Bayer, which would lead to twenty-plus years of music videos, commercials, Art-Directing, and blending words and sounds with imagery.

Charlie Art-Directed a large catalog of music videos, commercials, and movies, eventually holding the camera and directing commercial projects for international clients. He traveled the world and experienced all the comedy and tragedy of the entertainment industry. Changes in the production world and the advent of digital media inspired Charlie to return full-time to his Fine Art roots in 2019.

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
While making images is intrinsic and inevitable to who he is, Charlie recognizes that it is a privilege to make art. There is a constant tension between making work and making it work. He says it is a good problem to have if you have run out of space to make the pieces that he is compelled to create. There is a constant balance of ethereal with the practical. “Whenever I send out a commission, I thank them for supporting a living artist, it is a conversation between the artist and the patron. We need each other in this world.”

As an aesthete, Charlie has a natural interest in the spaces where his works go to live. It is an extension of the creative process to consider how Art is transformative to the environment and evocative of mood and light. He enjoys the process of collaboration with collectors and designers to create pieces that become a part of their narrative.

Aside from patron requests and his design eye, Charlie is always engaging in personal education to keep ideas fresh. Spending time in nature, visiting museums, watching films and cultivating relationships with artists around the world has enriched his vernacular.

“Take your blinders off and be ready to receive inspiration from anywhere.”

He is always looking, absorbing, asking questions and solving problems on his canvas. If you look at him closely, he’s always wearing a little paint.

Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Charlie draws on his formal education as a painter and illustrator to make decisions about what rules to break. “Abstraction is wonderful- it evokes a sense of emotion and relatability with its own set of definitions. Creating visual representation for elusive concepts.”

Charlie often says the process of painting is like trying to describe the sound of music. He is always struggling to manifest the essence of a visceral sensation in a 2-dimensional medium. All those years in production telling someone else’s stories lead to a yearning to use his own voice. What you see on the canvas currently is the culmination of 28 years of Art Direction and Observation. Now it’s personal. Many of his works evoke the ocean and aspects of the very place he started.

Charlie has continued his relationship with cinematic productions in Los Angeles through renting his paintings to movies and television. He collaborates with production designers and Interior decorators to make large-scale works that tell stories of characters and people that inhabit those spaces.

Charlie was invited by Portia DeRossi to create a collection of Synograph Prints created by her company General Public that are offered for sale through luxury retailer Restoration Hardware.

Contact Info:

• Email: Cleal9747@gmail.com
• Website: www.charlieleal.com
• Instagram: Charlieloyal2
• Facebook: Charlie Leal