Blake Boyd's work employs ancient and contemporary techniques, drawing upon traditional and modern icons. His art takes many forms, including paintings in clay, sculpture, photobooth photography, video, and site-specific installation. Collectively, all of these are components of a twenty-year conceptual artwork that Boyd views as two "visual" operas. The first opera,
Fidelio, began in 2001, and is a visual diary of Boyd's travels, from his visits with celebrities from
Andy Warhol's Factory in New York City, to his escapades in New York and London nightclubs. The second opera,
Romantika, is inspired by and dedicated to a hometown love interest, whom Boyd credits with mending his broken heart. Each opera will consist of a series of eleven separate exhibitions, totaling twenty-two exhibitions in all. Since 2005 Boyd has exhibited smaller installations,
Chamber Music, whose themes complement and support the opera.
Painting Boyd began painting professionally in 1987 with oils and acrylics on canvas. His apprenticeship that same year introduced him to the pre-Renaissance technique of water
gilding. Boyd uses his skill with the historic technique to reinterpret present-day icons and themes in an unfamiliar scale and setting to tell a story through their associations. The traditional medium also evokes reference to religious
iconography and calls into question contemporary values.
Photography Boyd has improved his technique since 1987, learning from his mentors
Andres Serrano and
Billy Name. His first portraits were taken using the strip
photobooth machines and, following the disappearance of the chemical based equipment, he has been using a Polaroid Macro 5 SLR camera with
Polaroid film. This medium has also died out. Historic portraits in these media include
Ralph Bakshi,
Nayland Blake,
Sir Peter Blake,
Al Jaffee,
Larry King,
Moby, and
Brad Pitt.
The Photobooth Projects Since the early 1990s, inspired by Andy Warhol's use of photobooth pictures in the early 1960s, Boyd has been documenting people from all walks of life in photobooth machines worldwide. In the mid-Nineties he conceived and pursued a photobooth opus in three parts.
Taylor Mead,
Billy Name, and
London Underground. Both of the Warhol Superstar series were staged in local public photobooths (New Orleans and Slidell) and achieved by costuming Mead and Name as actual pop characters, as in the Warhol silk-screens, with references to the Warhol films in which the two had performed. Boyd lived in London in 1996 and spent two months using public photobooths, mostly at tube stations, to take portraits of people from the streets.
London Underground is a timely documentation of British street-life in the 90's, now fading, the punks, the Bobbies, the skinheads. This residency also introduced Boyd to the
Young British Artists (Y.B.A.s), who he was able to document at the beginning of their movement. Boyd's portrait of Lady
Martha Sitwell, when she was living on the streets, has been featured in the April 8, 2024 issue of the Times of London and Bravo reality TV show, Ladies of London: The New Reign, Episode 1. A selection from the Billy Name series was published in
Lid magazine, issue thirteen, 2011.
The Polaroid Projects " by Blake Boyd Boyd's ongoing undertakings build upon this foundation. A fan of
Stanley Kubrick, he is inspired by the
documentary research that the director prepared for his films. The August 2007
National Geographic magazine cover headlined "New Orleans — Should it rebuild?", this, along with romanticized devastation-themed art collections and a public perception that New Orleans was still underwater prompted Boyd to undertake a positive art project. The first significant documentary portrait series,
Louisiana Cereal, was initiated as a desire to present an important, historical art exhibit recording the positive life force of the region post-
Hurricane Katrina and the
Deepwater Horizon oil spill, capturing the spirit of New Orleans and Louisiana. Boyd continues to record the personalities from and associated with his home state, and the collection has become a contemporary history of Louisiana. The five hundred portraits include Governor
Bobby Jindal, Senator
Mary Landrieu,
LTG Russel L. Honore, and actor
Patricia Clarkson. Boyd's interaction with the cross-section of regional icons inspired further conceptual collections: •
Fifty States grew out of Boyd's collaboration with New Orleans first responders. He was introduced to the tremendous fraternity that exists across the US with these specialists and conceived of a project to acknowledge and pay homage to their service. •
LIFE: Angola is a collection inspired by meeting with Warden
Burl Cain at Angola,
Louisiana State Penitentiary, St. Francisville, when Boyd photographed him for the
Louisiana Cereal project. This visit brought an even greater appreciation of the historic significance of Angola and the unique cycle of life there, warranting a broader, dedicated documentation.
Zombie Katrina Zombie Katrina is the culmination of the Louisiana Polaroid Trilogy. It is the final project undertaken with Boyd’s remaining stock of original Polaroid film. The concept originated while photographing
Larry King for
Louisiana Cereal as Boyd discussed the toxic legacy of
Hurricane Katrina and the
Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Boyd asked King if he would model for a portrait with special effects make-up to draw attention to the dangers of mankind’s pollution of the planet. The theme of portraits celebrities and individuals made up to speak about this issue developed into a cross -country project. Boyd travelled across the
United States with special effects make-up artists Bryan Fulk and Rob "The Kid" Lindores to document around 100 people as
zombies weaving their fates together through a conceptual narrative referencing
The Shining,
Shaun of the Dead, the writings of
Hunter S. Thompson and
Jack Kerouac’s
On the Road. The storyline features several of the more well-known models tying their fates together through front page
headlines, a water color illustrated journal and a series of oversize painted portraits. Featured Polaroid portraits include
Bruce Campbell,
Kevin Eastman,
Michael Hitchcock,
Al Jaffee,
Christopher Makos,
Taylor Mead,
Richard Meier,
Billy Name, John Stirrat,
Sean Yseult and members of
Robert Zemeckis’ family.
Taylor Mead Influenced by
the Factory and actor troupes, Boyd uses many recurring characters in his projects such as
Harry Shearer and
Holly Woodlawn. The first and most frequent collaborator was
Taylor Mead who, over twenty years, made drawings and paintings or performed in Boyd’s photographs and videos. A month before Mead's death, he was preparing to meet Boyd in New York City and drive back to New Orleans to resettle. He was going to prepare for an exhibition at Boyd's gallery, Boyd Satellite. Following Mead's death, Boyd and Ginette Bone put together a memorial exhibition titled "Taylor Mead in Exile", to which filmmaker Jim Jarmusch was a contributor.
Kenneth Anger Boyd has enjoyed adventures in and around Los Angeles with filmmaker Kenneth Anger. Documenting Anger in surviving chemical photobooths, with Polaroid and Fuji Instax and working on collaborative projects. They share the same interest in Disney and the Occult.
Disney symbolism Walt Disney visited and considered
Slidell, Louisiana, Boyd's birthplace, as the location for
Walt Disney World, before deciding upon
Orlando, Florida.
Disney World opened on Boyd's first birthday. Boyd's grandmother, Frida Boyd, was a secretary at Disney World and his two uncles (just a decade or less older than Boyd) worked there in their teenage years. Boyd visited this personal "mecca" every year until he was a teenager himself. Disney imagery is a recurring theme in Boyd's work. His paintings reinterpret the Disney images drawn from nineteenth century European fairytales. The depiction of characters such as
Pinocchio,
Alice in Wonderland, and
Snow White, in the medieval medium of water gilding, acknowledges them as contemporary Icons. (
Bryan Batt features one of Boyd's gilded Snow White paintings "Hard Luck Woman #11" in his 2011 book
Big, Easy Style: Creating Rooms You Love to Live In.) Boyd has been photographing celebrities in
Mickey Mouse Ears since the early 1990s. Artists in this series include
Harry Shearer,
Doug and Mike Starn,
Sir Peter Blake and
Tracey Emin, who sewed her own mouse ears for the project. ==Boyd Satellite==