When Melvyn Odom was four years old he colored in a birthday card of a duck dressed as a mailman. “Melvyn colored all this all by himself,” his mother scrawled in the bottom corner. And thus, his first documented piece of art came to be. Now, publishing house and eclectic interiors magazine Apartamento, is releasing a new monograph on Odom’s art, as edited by creative director and publisher Luis Venegas.  

Mel Odom: Gorgeous! is a documentation of Odom’s desires, fears, memories and pleasures. The selection of paintings and drawings, interspersed with short, tender quotes from an interview between Odom and Venegas, maps the trajectory of Odom’s career, from his early work published in Time and Playboy to his most recent pieces. 

As one flips through the pages of Gorgeous!, the reader encounters an infusion of artistic technicality and personal reflection. Sensuality appears in the form of intricate cross-hatching and drooping eyes of ecstasy. Razor-sharp jawlines mimic the decisive character of Odom’s strokes, while warm, heated tones mingle with bloody reds and virginal whites. Thick brows and parted lips breed desire, as coiffed hair and chiseled silhouettes sow the seeds of lust. Through the collection of artwork, we are offered a window into Odom’s inner monologue and the influences in his life that have metamorphosed into the Gorgeous! specimen. 

In Gorgeous!, Odom pulls from the colors of his past as he illustrates his present. Lamentations of first loves and acid-infused revelations inform his imagery, but so does the confusion and pain wrought by the AIDS epidemic. 

“I thought I was…somehow living on borrowed time…I would do these drawings…and know that these were going to remain once I was gone.”

Melvyn Odom, in conversation with Luis Venegas

In this book, Odom presents a testimony of his life. But it’s not just about him. It’s about any queer individual grappling with the merciless march of daily life. It’s as much about the trials and tribulations of an adolescent, small-town boyーOdom navigating his tiny tobacco town of Ahoskie, North Carolinaーas it is about anyone who’s experienced love or agony, internal conflict and inherent desire. 
Gorgeous! does as art does: it permits its viewers to resonate. It tells its own story, leaving just enough room for us to incorporate our own.