How Dark My Love

The painstakingly detailed paintings of US artist Joe Coleman, often rendered with a one-hair brush, have for decades been part of an alternative Americana that puts the repressed, the ostracized, the obscure, and the occult center stage. Portraits of killers (Ed Gein), freaks, visionaries (Hunter S. Thompson), and the criminally insane (Charles Manson) have made the painter a revered countercultural icon. But arguably his most challenging work is still ahead. How Dark My Love finds Scott Gracheff Coleman in the middle of his artistic process, thoroughly, incrementally working out a door-sized portrait of his muse and the love of his life, Whitney Ward. The film not only documents the painting process but also the couple’s profoundly intense emotional world, casting light and shadow on the people and the work, past and present. (Markus Keuschnigg)

In attendance of Scott Gracheff (director), Joe Coleman, Whitney Ward (protagonists)