Ian Robertson-Salt

PAINTER - MURALIST - TATTOOIST

Ian Robertson-Salt (b. Los Angeles, CA, 1989) is a painter, muralist, and tattooist from Los Angeles. He has worked as a muralist and mural conservator for the Mural Conservancy of Los Angeles, The City of Long Beach, The Social Public Art Resource Center, and Arts Bridging the Gap. In addition to his private and civic mural commissions, he has exhibited work in numerous group exhibitions throughout California. His work often focuses on endangered species and the relationships between humanity, technology, and ecology.

"Growing up in Los Angeles, I was exposed to many different cultures, ideologies, and socio-economic issues that have fueled my creative exploration. Above all, my art seeks to question what I have been told and how I perceive the world. My paintings are an exploration into multiple practices that range from realism, illustration, graphic design, and abstraction. The exploration of contemporary issues surrounding sustainability, poverty, intimacy, history, and identity are the driving forces of my creativity. The imagery in my work often represents one of these topics, while the abstraction, graphic elements, and color relationships represent my own process of questioning these issues and how they are represented in our culture. By juxtaposing these different themes into a singular framework, I am questioning their relationship to each other, to myself, and to the world as a whole. Some of these themes take on multifaceted representations, such as a realistic representation of an urban street scene overlaid with a graphic and stylized aerial map that represents the physical space and the ways people move through it. The geometric forms in my art represent pathways that we encounter in our daily lives, depicted as fragmented maps, architecture, graffiti, or physical objects. All of these aspects in my paintings are constructed simultaneously through my drawing and painting process. I build color relationships that reflect the complexities of these issues, while also seeking a sense of beauty from attempting to question and understand them. The most beautiful thing we can do in our lives is to explore the unknown with curiosity and understanding."—Ian Robertson-Salt