David Touster imagines that at the time the original photos for these works were taken, somebody probably said to somebody, "Nobody else is going to see these, right?" So who is to blame, the one for showing skin or the other for asking them to?

Art is storytelling. In "Private Pictures," Touster looks at how intimate behavior can often be infused with an element of blame. He tries to highlight that there are different sides to every story, all of them subjective and incomplete, and that it is the judgment, not the act, which should be condemned.

David Touster works from both original and vintage vernacular photographs, reducing the images' visual information to it's barest through computer pixilation and manipulation. He then prints these new images on canvas and paints them with acrylics, using a variety techniques. By leaving it to us to fill in details, we become aware of ourselves looking at the work, and it's when we participate, putting ourselves in another's shoes, that perhaps we can grow more compassionate.

David Touster's work has been in a number of group exhibitions. He had his first solo exhibit last year at the JanssenArtSpace in Palm Springs, CA. His work, including many portraits, is in collections throughout North and South America, and he is currently adapting an earlier-commissioned portrait of Eva Peron into tile to line the bottom of a 25-foot swimming pool of a new hotel in Buenos Aires, scheduled to open in 2009.

David Touster was raised in New York City, the son of an artist father and an art-collecting mother, where he received his degree in Graphics and Advertising from Parsons School of Design in NY. He then worked as a graphic designer at a number of studios (Pushpin; Intercontinental Hotels) and magazines (GQ; Vogue; Interiors) before moving to California to design for film and television.

"Private Pictures" at The Milo Gallery is David Touster's first show in Los Angeles.