Shy of discernment
Selected works of TL Lange
T.L. Lange, an important figurative and abstract artist, was born and raised in Charleston, SC. He studied drawing and painting at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, SC, where he met Paul Martyka, an influential art professor that encouraged his vision. He also met some like-minded musicians, and after a couple of years playing in Rock Hill and nearby Charlotte, his band headed to Atlanta. Along with opening for bigger and bigger acts in Atlanta, the band toured up and down the East Coast. After a poor performance in New York City before a Sony representative, however, the band began to backpedal and Lange’s love of art began to grow.
It was in Atlanta that he transformed from a rock star to an art star. Sold out shows, celebrity collectors, and representation by a global distributor led to T.L. opening a gallery in Salt Lake City. From there, back to North Carolina and Andrews, where his representative had an art factory, and on to Charlotte, where he established an atelier. Eventually he chose Black Mountain, along with a huge studio and gallery in Asheville’s River Arts District.
Lange started his work with “concrete visions” and actually began several paintings at one time. He tried to allow some form of synchronicity to determine his next decision. As he said:
I make marks for the sake of themselves. I create error that I find attractive in all our everyday lives. However, I leave it hanging three marks shy of discernment. What I mean by that is that I choose that it not be understood or scrutinized by its detail or its adherence to reality—only to be seen for its sense and its nostalgic response without my personal sentiment.
In 2002, after contracting the HIV-virus, T.L. took his own life at age 36.
During his short career, T.L. exhibited in numerous prominent galleries, including the Art Works, Human Arts, and Landsdell galleries in Atlanta, Art Dallas, Mary Bell Galleries in Chicago, Foster White Galleries in Seattle, and Artworks Gallery in Salt Lake City.
Today T.L. Lange’s remarkable work can be found in many private, corporate, and public collections, including Wentworth Galleries and Larson Juhl Frames, as well as Saks Fifth Avenue Corporation and Microsoft Corporation.
holy
c. 2000
Mixed media on canvas
13 inches x 13 inches unframed
21 inches x 21 inches framed
$1,900 – SOLD
Small People 1
c. 2001
Paper on painted wood panel
12 inches x 12 inches unframed
$1,000 – SOLD
Small People 2
c. 2001
Paper on painted wood panel
12 inches x 12 inches unframed
$1,000 – SOLD
Small People 3
c. 2001
Paper on painted wood panel
12 inches x 12 inches unframed
$1,000 – SOLD
Small People 4
c. 2001
Paper on painted wood panel
12 inches x 12 inches unframed
$1,000 – SOLD
I derive composition from chaos; the beauty in decay, the color of rusty pipes and layers of billboard advertisements. There are paintings everywhere that matter in the now; on the studio floor I keep littered with photographs. Torn paper flecks of paint, objects to trip over while looking for something else.
Small People 5
c. 2001
Paper on painted wood panel
12 inches x 12 inches unframed
$1,000 – SOLD
Pond
c. 2000
Mixed media on canvas
28 inches x 30 inches unframed
38 inches x 40 inches framed
$6,200
Offset Lake
2001
Mixed media on canvas
12 inches x 12 inches unframed
26 inches x 26 inches framed
$2,100
Light UTah
1999
Mixed media on canvas
21 inches x 25 inches unframed
27 inches x 31 inches framed
$1,600
Combed
2000
Mixed media on canvas
30 inches x 27 inches unframed
41 inches x 39 inches framed
$4,900
Try to allow some form of the work is filling the time in discovering how combinations ad infinitum make their way to my attention. I discover story lines that relate to my recollections of living; these perceptions carry mark after mark.
Salmando
1999
Mixed media on canvas
34 inches x 34 inches unframed
41 inches x 41 inches framed
$4,500
Green Goddess
1999
Mixed media on canvas
34 inches x 34 inches unframed
42 inches x 42 inches framed
$6,200
Ghola
1997
Mixed media on steel
42 inches x 63 inches unframed
$25,000
Rothko’s Door
1997
Mixed media on canvas
32 inches x 45 inches unframed
34 inches x 47 inches framed
NFS
I work in rapid bursts of momentum. I never give up on any particular work, I just cover and begin again with wherever my bemused momentum takes it. I continually remind myself “no rules.”
Castor
2001
Mixed media on canvas
42 inches x 52 inches unframed
$14,000
Outliner
2001
Mixed media on canvas
28 inches x 30 inches unframed
37 inches x 40 inches framed
$4,500
Mask
1998
Mixed media on canvas
22 inches x 35 inches unframed
29 inches x 42 inches framed
$4,000
City
2000
Mixed media on canvas
27 inches x 30 inches unframed
38 inches x 40 inches framed
$6,000 – SOLD
My work is the direct and immediate reverb of my life. It is an exact recording of my moments and means such only to me. I’ve come to this method as an understanding I’ve grown up with. I collected littered metal trinkets, string, staples, old Styrofoam packing, wire, strips of leather, plastic plant leaves, etc. my entire childhood, only to grow up needing more space to save it in.
Blue Farm 1 and Blue Farm 2
2000
Mixed media on canvas
19 inches x 18 inches unframed (each)
25 inches x 25 inches framed (each)
$5,400 (sold as a pair)
Vessel 7
2000
Mixed media on canvas
28 inches x 31 inches unframed
33 inches x 36 inches framed
$4,200
Bust
2001
Mixed media on canvas
32 inches x 32 inches unframed
$4,000
Ghost
1998
Wood, resin, paint on canvas
36 inches x 39 inches
NFS
Blue Chair
2000
Pigment, glass, paint & charcoal on fabric
19 inches x 19 inches unframed
29 inches x 29 inches framed
$4,000
I am obsessive about my work’s process and care little else than improving myself through it. The message and intent the work carries is an individual piece or groupings of similar works in time, and their explanations range from simple whimsical happenings evident or deep within the recesses of experiential thought.
(Framed) Abstract
1998
Paper under glass
9 inches x 9 inches unframed
24 inches x 24 inches framed
$2,800
Small People 6
c. 2001
Paper on painted wood panel
12 inches x 12 inches unframed
$1,000 – SOLD
Guardian
1998
Mixed media on canvas
4 feet x 5 feet unframed
$19,000
Small People 7
c. 2001
Paper on painted wood panel
12 inches x 12 inches unframed
$1,000 – SOLD
Anonymous Bathers
1998
Archival print on canvas
72 inches x 29 inches framed
$4,000
Southeast
1997
Collage and ink on paper
5 inches x 10 inches unframed
11 inches x 20 inches framed
$1,500
Tareyton
1995
Paper, foil and paint on cardboard
10 inches x 8 inches unframed
14 inches x 12 inches framed
$1,500
I have often heard artists speak as though their work were a necessary impulse to live by, and thinking little of it, kept doing mine to live. I now know that I could no more lay down making pictures than stop breathing. So as I go on as a man about the ideal debt upon any man to improve through the discipline of constant self-scrutiny, I know the work will become as evidence.