What If | Greg Latch | Original Oil Painting

Original oil painting by Greg Latch · Painter and mixed media artist · Available at Marcolina’s Fine Arts Gallery, Tampa, Florida · Ships worldwide

What If is a square painting packed edge to edge with faces, eyes, and shapes that might be people, animals, or buildings. A big orange head with a bullseye eye sits near the center, looking straight out. Above it another eye stares from a green and rust shape, and a small figure in orange sits near the top left like a child on a lap. On the left a figure in a white hood or turban looks out from inside a green outline, and at the lower right someone in a dark red cap sits with a face half hidden beneath it. The colors are loud: cobalt blue, orange, yellow, lime and bottle green, all held in place by thick black and white outlines, and the paint is built up so the lines stand off the surface.

Nothing in it is resolved, which is the point. Every shape can be read two ways. An arm becomes a street, a hat becomes a hill, a face turns into a doorway. The painting keeps asking what if this were a person, what if it were a place, what if it were something else, and it answers yes to all of them at once.

The title is a question, and so are the eyes. Several of them are looking at you from different corners, none of them with the same expression. Greg says his work is not really about the image, it is about what the image can say in more than one way, and this one is that idea at full volume.

Collector’s Note

At nearly 36 inches square, What If is easy to place. It works on a wall by itself or in a grouping, and the square format suits a living room, an office, or a stairwell where you pass it more than once. The color is strong, so it can carry a quiet room, and the raised outlines catch light differently through the day. A virtual viewing or a visit in person shows the surface better than a photograph.

Acquisition

Available through Marcolina’s Fine Arts Gallery with worldwide shipping, full insurance, and professional art packaging. Payment plans available. Private viewings by appointment in Tampa, Florida. Virtual viewings available for collectors anywhere in the world. Payment plans are arranged directly with Marcolina, and every inquiry is answered personally within 24 hours. Each original comes with a Certificate of Authenticity. Contact us to inquire. New to collecting? Read our collector guide →

A standard shipping rate is charged at checkout. Once your work is packed, we calculate the actual shipping cost for its size and destination. If there is a difference, we will follow up to either invoice the additional amount or refund the difference, whichever applies.

About the Artist

Greg Latch was born in Mississippi and studied acting and fine art at the University of Mississippi. He later worked as a portrait artist in Jackson Square in New Orleans, and in Tampa he spent years as a nurse in the city’s jails and a psychiatric hospital. He did not come to painting through galleries or art school. He came to it by watching people, and it shows.

For thirteen years he painted at Artist Unlimited alongside artists with master’s degrees from around the world, learned from master painter Ray Paul, and taught drawing with live models. He builds his surfaces with oils, markers, and a range of knives, layering until the canvas turns almost sculptural, and he works from spontaneous drawings and mismatched imagery.

His work sits between portraiture and abstraction, and he says himself that it is not really about the image. He was featured in the Persona exhibition at Marcolina’s Fine Arts Gallery alongside Blake Emory, Guillo Pérez 3, and Mark Rendini. He lives and works in Tampa, Florida.

View more work by Greg Latch →

Read Greg’s full story →

Meet all of our artists →