Today we’d like to introduce you to Louis Barak.
Every artist has a unique story. Can you briefly walk us through yours?
My story is a compilation of the Chicago experience: graffiti, fist fights, dodging gang bangers, and hopping turnstiles. My parents busted their asses to provide and as a kid I was often left alone to explore my imagination. This is where my art came in. My father had several friends who were graffiti artists including “Rooster” who was killing it in the late eighties/early nineties. He painted me a Vaughn Bode lizard and break dancers on the back of my denim jacket when I was 6 years old. The jacket was so dope, it was stolen from me…. I also had a pair of Jordan’s stolen from me too when I was ten, but that’s another story.
My parents were always very supportive and allowed me to dive into the artist lifestyle at full speed. At 12 I was taking the train downtown to the Marwen Foundation to take free art classes offered for kids from the Chicago Public Schools system. I attended Lakeview high school, which had a great art curriculum. By 14 I was doing graffiti full force on rooftops along the CTA’s red, blue, and brown lines. Between Lakeview high school, Marwen Foundation, and Gallery 37, I was living the life of a paid working artist by the age of 16.
I went on to attend Pratt Institute in Brooklyn for two and a half years then transferred back to the School of the Art Institute of Chicago to complete my Bachelor of Fine Art with a concentration in painting.
I became disillusioned by the art world in my early twenties and, quite frankly, I was not yet good enough to show my work in galleries, so I tried my hand at tattooing. Being a Moroccan Jewish kid from art school working in early 2000’s tattoo shops, which still had the biker shop mentality, was not easy. I was regularly called an “art fag”, got swastikas etched in my station, had my equipment vandalized, and faced other anti-Semitic incidents on a regular basis, but I stuck with it. Today in 2018, the industry has evolved and those small-minded fools are relics of the past.
All of these difficulties have only made me a stronger artist. My hunger to grow as an artist and a person continues and has led to refinement in both my paintings and tattoos.
Please tell us about your art.
My art is a culmination of my experience in tattooing, graffiti, and fine art- practices that I try to merge into an amalgamation of one style- my style. I utilize my line quality that I’ve developed from years of tattooing and have applied it to my paintings. On the flip side, I like to incorporate my painterly approach into my tattooing. It’s been a never-ending quest to find my voice with my work. Although I’ve made great strides in the last year and a half, I am your typical artist- my own harshest critic. I’m still not satisfied and perhaps will never be, but this hunger allows me to keep on pushing towards the best version of myself in my work.
My work tends to incorporate subject matter from my own experiences. My art includes a range of positive and negative themes ranging from disenfranchised youth, anti-Semitism, and drug addiction to the beauty of fatherhood, love, and family. I strive for my work to be both pleasing and provocative- I like to provide my audience both a beautiful visual and an intellectual challenge.
As an artist, how do you define success and what quality or characteristic do you feel is essential to success as an artist?
Success for an artist is being sought after for who you are as opposed to what people want you to be. A successful artist must possess a “zero fucks given” attitude and be willing to sacrifice socioeconomic comforts to pursue their vision.
When an artist is able to earn a living, even a very modest living, they are successful essentially because they are happy and doing what they love to do. I drive a car with over 130,000 miles on it and can’t even think about going on a vacation, but the fact that I wake up every day and tattoo/ paint imagery that comes from my soul satisfies me to the utmost. I can go to bed at night knowing that I have stayed true to myself and I am doing something I have wanted to do since I was 9 years old.
How or where can people see your work? How can people support your work?
The easiest way for people to see my work is either on my website or Instagram. I also exhibit my work in various exhibitions throughout the year, including at Sideshow Gallery. I am a resident artist at Revolution Tattoo in Bucktown, so feel free to come check us out and maybe get a tattoo.
People can support my work- or any artist’s work for that matter- by opting to buy original artwork produced by local artists as opposed to buying mass produced corporate art sold by retail chains. If you cannot afford to buy art, simply supporting artists on social media by “liking” and/or “sharing” their artwork is free and goes a long way.
Contact Info:
- Address: Revolution Tattoo 2221 N. Western Ave.
Chicago, IL 60647 - Website: louisbarak.com
- Phone: 773-486-8888
- Email: baraktattoos@gmail.com
- Instagram: @louisbarak
Getting in touch: VoyageChicago is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
