You’ve probably never heard of Chester Charles, the master impressionist whose turn-of-the-century paintings of queer life were posthumously discovered in a Cleveland attic. And that’s because Charles is the whimsical creation from ClownVamp, a self-proclaimed AI-assisted anonymous gay artist.
Still, a massive and long-awaited retrospective of Charles’ work was held at Canvas 3.0, in partnership with Web3 platform Transient Labs and NFT Marketplace SuperRare, for one day on June 21. Titled “The Lost Grand Master”, it offered the comfort of looking at works of the most familiar genres and a quiet unease at the story they reveal. Impressionist works of art are a must in museums, but works reflecting the queer gaze are largely absent. This realization came to ClownVamp by accident while trying to conjure up images of a father and son walking through the woods. The AI model bugged, offering two fathers and one son instead. Thus began ClownVamp’s journey to spark alternative art history.
vampire clown, A Visit to the Dance, 1892 (2023). Courtesy of the artist.
“We live in a socially constructed world, and history is an even more altered reflection of this distorted sense of truth. AI allows us to break, remix and confront history, showing what could and should have been,” ClownVamp said in the exhibit notes.
The 23 works ClownVamp presented in his first solo exhibition contained visions of his fictional artist, each accompanied by text that laid bare Charles’ thoughts and questions. As with any in-depth project involving image generators, “The Lost Grand Master” is the product of considerable trial and error, with ClownVamp eventually discovering a way to blend two groups of images the AI was familiar with: queer art and historical art.
The collection certainly hits many impressionist beats. There are the misty white cliffs of monnet In Doves by the seathe depth of by Van Gogh greens in the grass layered with The softest touch, and more perhaps overtly, a scene from Degas ballet flats, one transformed by ClownVamp into a cheerful all-male hot pink affair.
“The Lost Grand Master” expands on Clownvamp’s first collection, “The Truth,” which imagined another Impressionist artist’s paintings in the wake of an alien invasion, and his habit of using artificial intelligence to play and imagine alternative stories.
“I believe AI is a tool,” he added, “that allows us to take our collective history and reimagine it.”
See more images from the series below.
ClownVamp, ‘Doves by the Sea II, 1882’, 2023. Image: courtesy of the artist.
ClownVamp, “Two Sailors, 1885”, 2023. Image: courtesy Image: courtesy of the artist.
ClownVamp, ‘The Softest Touch 1888’, 2023. Image: courtesy of the artist.
ClownVamp, “Matthew, 1887”, 2023. Image: courtesy of the artist.
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