"Of paint and water"

Lucas Ngo's figures are always on the verge of dissolving, melting, becoming something else. Rarely named, his models are already ghosts, ghostly boys whose body parts are already erased or in reserve. Here an arm is missing, there the legs, part of the head. This is partly the effect of framing, perhaps a play of contrast between light and shadow, but it is all the more visible because the rest of the body is drawn. The contour work that tames the color fades in places and becomes porous; thus the body becomes sensation, and above all, a state of being. Using oil in a singular way, on canvas or paper but always with the addition of water, he suggests a troubled surface. The drips have this in common with emotions that can only be provoked and not controlled. In a paradoxical way, Lucas Ngo offers portraits that elude the gaze (...)." Henri Guette