Miles Ingrassia

Toronto based painter Miles Ingrassia explores intimacy, tension, and vulnerability through expressive figurative scenes. Drawing from staged photographs and personal moments, his loose, gestural paintings capture the emotional complexity of young male relationships. In this interview, he discusses process, influence, and the balance between control and chaos in painting.

Where does your interest in art come from, and how did you start painting/creating?

I was always interested in drawing when I was growing up. Honestly I think I just liked the attention and showing things off. I loved magazines and comic books. I did my undergrad in printmaking, and then shifted to painting in grad school.

How did your education at OCAD and York University define your current visual language?

I'm not really sure if institutions drive my visual language. What I did get out of both was a community that took arts more seriously. Before that I was hanging out with graffiti writers and trading sketchbooks. They took things seriously as well, but in a different way. What I got out of school was a way to really interrogate my ideas.

What are the recurring themes in your work?

A lot of my work revolves around ideas of intimacy, and the different ways it can be performed, particularly through the lens of young men. I'm looking for these small moments that often get overlooked, and then trying to magnify and exaggerate them.

How would you describe your style?

I think it's so tough to try and define your own style. There's things I try to actively engage and things I try to resist, but it's always a push and pull. I like to think of my work as figurative, gestural, loose, maximalist.

How do you choose the models for your staged scenes? What is your creative process?

Maybe it's dumb to say but I try to not choose. I work with photos of friends, Craigslist models, and selfies, modifying things so they don't become too structured and narrative across a whole body of work. I like things to be organic and not overly poured over. 

Process wise, I have steps or stages I go through, and then try to negotiate things at each stage to keep things stylistically working for me.

So like, I'll work on a drawing and project that into a canvas, line it in red and do a bright transparent gradient. In the next step I'll modify my paint so it's unwieldy and hard to control, and focus on working fast, embracing chaos. I'll go back in after for a second layer, and that's where I really try to resist the urge to correct and fix. There's always parts that need it, but balancing control is a core part of my process.

Tell us about one of your works in particular and explain its meaning and your aesthetic choices.

The piece Devil’s Advocate has three young men outside of a bar caught up in a drunken argument. The faces are exaggerated and animated. They're caught up in it but there's also something really loving and tender about it. My intention here is that intimate moments aren't always romantic and tender, but can be underscored with tension and disagreement. These are the things that round out any relationship. Aesthetically I really wanted to play with light and temperature; dark tones, reflected neons, and so on. It's a moment caught in time, so things aren’t always necessarily resolved. There are moments that are quickly rendered and left to be loose, while otherssee more refinement. This is kind of how memory works, some parts are crystal clear and others are just a blurry haze.

Which artists or Is there a specific artist who inspires you, and why?

I really love painters like Jenny Saville, Amanda Wall, and Eric Fischl. All of their respective works have this level of ease and confidence that I'm constantly pushing to achieve.

Do you have any upcoming exhibitions or projects you would like to share with us?

I'm currently finishing up a big bank of new works for The Artist Project in Toronto in March. I've got a couple other things on the horizon but I don't think I can talk about them yet.

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To learn and see more of Miles Ingrassia's work: website + Instagram.