Robert Standish | Juxtapoz Magazine | Matthew Newton

Robert Standish is late. Not by hours, or even an exorbitant number of minutes, but tardy enough to cause mild concern. His large Malibu home, a multi-level building perched at the edge of the Pacific Coast Highway, is dark. The half dozen cars and SUVs parked in the driveway are quiet, the engines free of knocks and pings or any hint of recent use. And though one would assume the home’s doorbell is wired properly, multiple pushes of the button have not summoned a single person. It would appear, to even the most dull-witted observer, that Mr. Standish is not home. That is, until a Toyota Prius comes speeding to an abrupt halt in the driveway.

“Sorry I’m late,” Standish says, emerging from the passenger side of the car and flashing a smile as he extends his hand. Tall and thin, with a pleasant face framed by sandy-brown hair, Standish looks deceptively younger than his 43 years. The Los Angeles-born artist then introduces his companion, a striking dark-haired young woman named Candice. “This is my muse,” he says, motioning to her with one arm while he types in the code for his home security system with the other. Standish has made plans to photograph Candice tonight as the subject for one of his upcoming paintings. As the garage door slowly opens, a cozy studio space is revealed, and Standish flashes a wry smile once more. “Please, come in.”

Considered a relative newcomer to the art world (he first picked up a paint brush in the late 1990s), Standish has garnered praise from critics, curators, and collectors for his highly nuanced photo-realistic style of painting. When he initially arrived on the scene in 1999, what set Standish apart, besides the fact that his work was well-received, was that he lacked any type of formal art training. Now, nearly a decade later, if you look at the price tag of an average Standish piece, you’ll see that skipping art school may have been one of the best decisions he ever made. His steadily increasing popularity seems the result of both a growing interest in the subject matter of his work and genuine awe over his natural ability as a painter.

“It’s very refreshing to see work that puts the aesthetic first,” says Carrie Secrist, owner of Carrie Secrist Gallery in Chicago. When she first saw a Standish painting she was struck by the artist’s technical skill with a brush. But her appreciation quickly exceeded pure aesthetics. “His work has an undertow,” she adds. “It pulls the viewer in.” Secrist, who now represents Standish, will host the artist’s third solo exhibition this coming October in Chicago.

Once inside the house, Standish is greeted by Solomon, his Arabian Greyhound who—from what I’m told—hails from Idaho and was recently featured in Vogue. A short trip up a flight of stairs takes us into the living room and yields a perfect view of one of Standish’s signature pieces: A large, wall-size painting titled “Girls, Girls, Girls (Viagra).” It is part of the artist’s ongoing branded series, where corporate logos are subtly embedded in candid street scenes that feature prostitutes bathed in neon light and homeless men staring out from desperate, troubled eyes. In this particular painting, a blond-haired woman is captured with a blank, mannequin-like expression on her face. The lights from a nearby strip club are blurred in the background, and the word “Viagra” is angled vertically in a swath of color. As we look at the piece, Standish informs me it is being shipped to a buyer in the next several weeks. It sold for $65,000.

Discovering a greater magic

“We just met,” Standish says, motioning toward Candice. “I’m being serious. We met before I went to New York five or six days ago. This is the first time I’ve worked with her, but I have good hopes.” He is sitting on an ottoman in his living room as he talks. Candice sits across from him on a sofa, eating a bowl of fresh mangoes he just sliced for her. Solomon is curled up on the floor, surveying the room, looking bored.

Standish offers this information after being asked how he selects the subjects for his paintings. “I used to introduce myself as the artist Basil Hallward,” he says, “and tell the person I’m interested in doing a portrait of them. Of course it always draws blank stares. So for the most part I’ve stopped doing it.”

Basil Hallward is one of the main characters in the Oscar Wilde novel The Picture of Dorian Gray. Hallward is an artist who discovers, in his friend Dorian Gray, the qualities he’s been searching for in a model to help him paint his masterpiece. Standish is attracted to the Hallward character, perhaps because he sees similarities between their shared artistic visions. And while he only occasionally uses the alias, he still shares the hope that each new subject may be the key to a transcendent new painting.

“I approached [Candice] at a Whole Foods—it seemed like a healthy enough place to do so,” Standish says, laughing. “So if I approach somebody, it’s with the intention that this will be my masterpiece. The greater magic is what results.”

“He was actually really cool about it,” Candice adds. “It’s not like when some guys approach you, and it’s sort of creepy. I trusted him. He said, ‘Check my website, this is real.’”

Standish, who is calm but confident when he speaks, is very matter of fact about his artistic sensibilities. It’s through trial and error, perhaps, that he has earned this level of confidence.

Before pursuing a career as a painter, Standish drifted between several professions—from boxing and jewelry making, to acting and even psychology. “I was also a lifeguard,” he adds. “This is a true story. I worked at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel, in Beverly Hills. So I’ve done it all.” When asked if he ever saved anyone he quickly responds, saying: “Just myself, I quit.”

Use your illusion

“It gets started with this inner need to find out what’s going on with a person, from how they project their personality and behavior, to what is really going on inside,” Standish says, describing what he looks for in a subject. He searches for the best way to explain the emotion. “[It’s] that sort of comfort in one’s own skin when faced with all the things going on around us and how we cope,” he continues, “and whether that coping mechanism is successful or not, and how connected to one’s own true feelings [the subject is] and if they’re able to communicate those feelings authentically.” He then pauses to take a breath before a wide smile splits across his face. “If that’s all going on good,” he says, “I’m not interested in you. But if it’s not going on, then there’s a part of me that relates to that and it has me interested.”

In many of his works, Standish has discovered the sort of veiled but alluring connection he is searching for in the working girls of Hollywood’s Sunset Strip. “I typically use strippers or prostitutes because, for me at least, they represent people who have to project something that might not be [innately] authentic,” he says. “So there’s more potential for illusion.”

The illusion that these women portray is what Standish seeks to capture, and even manipulate for a desired effect if necessary. Working in paint, Standish is able to recast the photos he works from—tweaking the lighting, background, or any number of details that seem out of place during composition.

“There’s another element too,” he says. “Where some scenes are posed, others are very candid in that the model hasn’t been approached. Whether it’s somebody on the street or elsewhere, so they might not even know this original image exists.”

When further pressed Standish remains vague on the topic. “Some people might actually be a working girl,” he adds, “and some people might be asked to pose as a working girl.” His eagerness to retain the mystery of the model’s authenticity is understandable, especially considering his dual role as painter and visual manipulator.

“Standish resuscitates the post-Pop style of photo-realism to demonstrate that, even in the digital age, we believe too readily what we are shown,” says Peter Frank, a senior curator at the Riverside Art Museum and art critic for the LA Weekly.

“Girls, Girls, Girls, (Viagra)’ speaks to the disconnect between reality and fantasy that pervades contemporary American consciousness,” he adds. “First of all, it's the camera's eye, not the human's. Second, it's Hollywood's idea of Hollywood, a fantasyland of tawdriness where the hookers look like starlets. In fact, it's vice versa. By replicating and amplifying all this glitzification, Standish is trying to make his audience understand not just the fact that life isn't Klute, but that our desire for it to be drops us into a cognitive dissonance with the everyday.”

The search for authenticity

“When I was growing up,” Standish says, “I remember relating emotionally to Edward Hopper's work and the film "Taxi Driver." After those early influences, I do believe when it came to another artists' work influencing mine, it was more about how they approached the work. Artists like Andy Goldsworthy, whom I get the sense is deeply and authentically connected to his work. His process clearly reflects that he creates what is personally and artistically necessary. Goldsworthy would do his work regardless of compensation.”

It’s no surprise that Standish admires artists like Goldsworthy who appear to have such an authentic connection to their own work. It’s the same relationship he strives to have to his own paintings, and perhaps does. His pieces often appear weighted with personal investment. Not only in the time spent creating, but in the visual portrayal of the subjects he comes to know so intimately—in situation both real and contrived. That personal investment can be heard in the urgency of his voice when talking about the work. Standish conveys the feeling that, for him, painting might be more vocation than career.

So when asked if he sees himself working as a painter for the rest of his life, his answer is not surprising.

“Yes,” he says. “But whether it’ll be work that appears to be photo-realism I couldn’t say. There has to be that continued inspiration, because if not, at some point you start hurting yourself. You have to still get something out of it. But if your value is only to have something that is recognizably you, and the market is demanding ‘I want that because it’s recognizable and it’s in my home and everyone will know who painted it.’ Well, if you’re okay with that, fine. But for me, it wouldn’t be enough. I’m willing to change.”