David Lock: Masculine Meanings
Leicester-born British artist, David Lock graduated from Goldsmiths, University of London, with an MA in Fine Art, in 2001, following a first-class BA (Hons) in Fine Art from The University of Reading, in 1999. He has exhibited his work throughout the UK and internationally. In 2018, his solo exhibition, ‘Fragmented Eros’, staged at Studio 1.1, East London, met with much acclaim. In 2018, his painting ‘El Muniria’ was included in the prestigious John Moores Painting Prize, after which the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, acquired the painting for its permanent collection.
In 2011, Lock received the Abbey Award from the British School at Rome, enabling him to study Roman artefacts. In 2021, he curated the exhibition ‘Burra and Friends’ at Rye Art Gallery, West Sussex, which showcased the work of the artist, Edward Burra and his contemporaries, together with contemporary Queer artists.
Since graduating, he has established himself as an innovative painter of the human form – and in particular the male figure. He is concerned with the various depictions of masculinity as represented in popular culture and the mass media, and the ways in which these ideas may be unstable. What exactly does it mean to be a man today, particularly during our present period in which gender and sexuality are being scrutinised and reevaluated as never before?
His continuing series, ‘Misfits’, was begun in the mid-2000s.
These works take the form of oil paintings of figures in interiors, or large
watercolours of male heads. These images are initially arrived at by tearing or
cutting up photographs from lifestyle journals or fashion magazines and reconstructing
them as collaged reference material – a kind of disjointed puzzle of
information - which the artist then works up and finalises in paint. The
fractured, mismatched nature of these images is compelling, calling into
question the very nature of representation and meaning. The identities of
Lock’s reinvented heads and figures are not fixed. They are imperfect, ‘damaged’,
ragged and vulnerable. They are broken into sections, strips, and segments,
before coalescing into a final image. The men in these works are not portraits
in the conventional sense, but fragmented cyphers, emblems of constant change. The
personal integrity of the individuals is subverted.
Essentially, they are hybrids, made new and whole from pieces of received
visual and cultural information. The viewer engages with the pictures on
multiple levels, as they navigate between recognition and ambiguity. Lock poses
the question: How is male identity formed and directed? He suggests that it is
a fragile edifice constructed on the shifting sands of unreliable cultural
constraints. The fragmentation in his paintings hints at the struggles many men
face in conforming to societal expectations, and it reveals the disconnect
between physical appearance and inner identity. In deconstructing the idealised
male form, Lock highlights vulnerability.
As a gay artist, David Lock is also keenly attuned to the ways in which the gay male identity is formed against the heterosexual model. How is a gay person to negotiate these all-pervasive directives, which are everywhere we look - in the street, in advertising, in movies, on social media? Even a casual scan of ubiquitous gay-themed Instagram accounts, for instance, will reveal endless examples of gay men presenting ‘perfect’ male bodies which, while celebrating gayness in an empty, self-absorbed way, also deny anything that falls short of this unrealistic, hollow ‘ideal’. As a wheelchair user, the result of an accident when he was 19, Lock is very conscious of being outside of this imposed perception. Gay identity has fairly recently become a prominent theme in contemporary art, reflecting the complexities and nuances of the LGBT experiences in a rapidly evolving sociopolitical landscape. Gay artists are increasingly using their work to explore personal narratives, challenge societal norms, and advocate for visibility and representation. Important gay icons from history stand as beacons of hope against the injustices of society, then and now.
One such gay icon is the subversive British playwright, Joe Orton, who happens to be Lock’s uncle. In 2017, Lock was included in London’s Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA)’s exhibition ‘What the Artist Saw: Art Inspired by the Life and Work of Joe Orton’. This was to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Joe Orton’s death at the hands of his partner, Kenneth Halliwell. The radical, influential playwright is acknowledged as a key figure in opposing the rigid homophobia of the 1960s.
For the exhibition, Lock created the installation, ‘Looted’, which in part took inspiration from the collage wall in the Islington bedsit, which Orton shared with Halliwell. Over many months, the pair had systematically covered the walls with pages torn out of art books from the library. With this in mind, Lock created a large, complex inkjet backdrop upon which to hang his paintings. His ‘wallpaper’, however, consisted only of images of classical sculptures combined with photographs of notable gay men of the C20th. Lock said of this work, “I wanted to use images of the gay men that had inspired me - and celebrate that. Joe had died before I was born, but he was also the first gay person I was aware of. I could relate to him in terms of my emerging gay consciousness, growing up in the 1980’s, and I wanted to acknowledge that by making a collage which showed that contemporary gay lives grow out of a shared gay history.” [1]
Lock grew up under the looming shadow of AIDS, which swept through generations of gay men. During that dark period, homosexuality was often associated with illness, trauma and death, and many of the hard-won battles for gay equality were sidelined. Today, there are a few more freedoms for gay people, but Lock has observed that “With these newfound freedoms we should never take anything for granted. Just from looking at the current political climate, it’s obvious that our fought-for liberal values are already being eroded.”[2]
It is only comparatively recently that homosexual themes and the gay experience have found acceptance in the art mainstream. Today, as never before in history, gay artists are able to exhibit works that celebrate their lived experience. David Lock’s fractured imagery points to the multifaceted nature of human experience. He invites a re-examination of masculinity amidst the diverse expressions of male identity. His pictorial narratives not only foster a sense of community but also provide visibility and representation in a world that still often marginalises gay voices. When viewing his work, we may gain a richer understanding of human experience, and perhaps reconsider received perceptions of identity, love, and belonging.
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