Artworks by Darren Jekel

A contemporary artist from the San Francisco bay, I currently live and work in Middletown, CA, USA. I learned traditional oil painting methods from Wayne Thiebaud in the 1980’s and later drew inspiration from Anselm Kiefer to incorporate unconventional elements. This combination of classical technique and nontraditional materials defines the character of my work. My visual language combines expressive figuration with gestural abstraction. Distinctive brushwork and richly textured surfaces give my paintings a recognizable physical presence. I create compositional tension by balancing organic curves with an underlying, tentative grid structure, producing images that feel both wildly dynamic and carefully constructed. Humor and multiple layers of meaning remain important elements in my work, though I increasingly seek to move beyond the irony often associated with postmodernism. Ultimately, I am driven to communicate in painting the love, beauty, and existential despair that I feel.