Featured Artist Interview: Vincent Edmond Louis
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KiptonART interviewed newly joined artist Vincent Edmond Louis about his work, life and inspiration.

Q: Who/what is your biggest influence or inspiration right now?
I think this is a difficult question to answer as my influences varies as I develop. People and places are my biggest influence. A persons life, story , character and/or situation contributes to how the piece will turn out. The place where I took the photograph is also a very important factor in the out come of the piece.

Q: What is the first thing that comes to mind after an opening?
The first thing that comes to mind after an opening would be that I hope they enjoyed my stories. The most difficult part about showing and selling these pieces is that many of the have personal stories on them and may be offensive to some and make others laugh but at the end of the day they are still personal. A journal if you will.

Q: Why do you work in this medium?
From a young age I have been visually intrigued by all images: films, tv shows, comic books, art books, etc.. I took a camera on my first trip to India when I was 12 and still go over the images. I hope to compare them upon my return this summer. The reason why I paint and write on my photographs stems from living with my Vietnamese grandmother. Every time we go through photo albums or a shoe box full of pictures we have to turn the image around to see when it was taken, and who was in it, to understand the story. So I thought I should write the story on the front of the photograph? I have the space (considering that my photographs are 20 times bigger then the ones she has from years past) and why not allow my imagination to run and add color to black and white pictures?

Q: What is one of your favorite past exhibitions?
This actually has nothing to do with my work but radical fashion at the V&A London in 2001. It was a mixture of designers with Eco friendly set designers. It's hard to explain, you just really had to be there. One of my favourite galleries (hoping one day to show there) is the White Cube London. 

Q: Do you collect anything?
I collect exotic photography/art books and magazines. A few examples are 32c, Above, Love, 10, Sleek, Dear Dave and my personal favourite and one day hope to be a contributing artist is Exit Magazine.

Q: What are you currently working on?
I am currently working on the first of ten chapters of a life project I am doing called "Famous Unknowns and Everything Else". The project consists of 100 portraits per chapter. I will be publishing the series at the end of the year, which hopefully will sold on KiptonART. A quarter of the proceeds will go to various charities.