Artospective: Chimps and Astronauts Paintings by Chris Leib from California.

An small Interview with Chris Leib

Who and from where are you?

I am an artist who paints chimps and astronauts mostly. I’m from the beautiful state of California.

How you got into this?

A couple years into college I found myself jaded, and instead of taking notes, began to fill my notebooks with drawings. Mostly comic and fantasy type stuff. The economic circumstances after graduating were dismal, there were few jobs. A friend brought me an ad that was posted in the Architecture dept. asking for sketches and doodles. It turned out to be two guys starting a small company. They liked my drawings, but then I didn’t hear anything. Four months went by, then one morning they showed up on my porch and offered me a job creating fantasy illustrations. I said ‘sure’! I worked alongside 4 incredibly talented illustrators. I had no idea what I was doing at that point as I hadn’t gone through much art training. The other illustrators gave me a lot of tips. One guy I worked with, George Riemann, who later did covers for the New Yorker Magazine, was also doing ad agency jobs. It was pretty motivating to work with such creative people. I then pursued further training and worked for many years as an illustrator for McGraw-Hill and also began showing in galleries.

What is your driving force?

I am never quite satisfied with what I’ve done. I always feel I can improve with each new piece.

What kind of work you do and why?

I paint using traditional methods. Though I incorporate other techniques as well. I mostly paint primates and infantile astronauts in reinterpreted poses and situations often referencing historical events. On the one hand, the chimps represent our more primal, bacchanalian nature. But alongside the tantrum prone infantile astronauts, they appear a wise protector. Astronauts are a long held symbol of humankind’s greatest achievements and potential. As a shrunken infantile form of that symbol, it lends itself to humorous and dwarfed visions of the species.