“Raw. Worn. Beaten, but loved. Life, stripped bare. Amid the chaos of family life lies a feeling of safety and comfort that I try to replicate in my work. Drawing on my collection of imagery of cultural markings and people, places and things, I like to explore beauty in its most organic and real state; stripping back the layers to reveal a subject in its most truthful state.”
Jordy Kerwick began his painting career in 2016. Kerwick has quickly acquired global recognition for his bold, raw and unapologetic approach to palette and pattern, executing vivid, expressionistic and highly stylized compositions. Domestic objects, predatory animals, and mythical beasts, taxidermy rugs ornamented with geometric markings, double headed king cobras, ferocious fanged tigers, and feather maned unicorns, populate his figurative canvases and create a contemporary folklore or fable that is playful, kinetic and arcane.
Known for his colorful, eclectic still-life paintings, Kerwick’s latest body of work explores the fantastical elements and storied visions of the artist’s interior imagination where new and unknown terrains collide. Using a variety of materials, from oil, acrylic and spray paint on canvas, to oil stick and collage on paper, the artist’s “the more mistakes, the merrier” approach rejoices in the fortuitous relationships that arise between unexpected combinations of color, texture, and form.
Kerwick’s striking visual language stems largely from his domestic lifestyle. Art historical references are entangled with ancient iconography. Symbols from Egyptian art combine with tropes from popular culture, such as the bold and electrifying color schemes of comic book series’ heroes and villains.
His most recent work draw inspiration from Gaugain’s figurative, pictorial worlds, considering the gestural and the abstract in his nuanced construction of richly tactile, courageously vibrant, and flattened compositions.