Jay Stern

Photograph by Kyle Johnson

Jay Stern (born 1991) received a BFA in painting from the University of Cincinnati and an MFA in arts leadership from Seattle University. This year Stern will exhibit two solo presentations in Portland, Maine, and Los Angeles and show new work in a group exhibition at UTA Artist Space in Atlanta. In the winter of 2023–24, he attended the James Castle House Residency in Boise and was awarded a grant through the Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation. Previous solo and group exhibitions include NOON Projects, Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Turley Gallery, Caldbeck Gallery, Sears Peyton Gallery, Specialist, Studio e, Able Baker Contemporary, Grant Wahlquist Gallery, and Koplin Del Rio. Stern’s work has been featured in publications such as Booooooom, Decor Maine, Art New England, Art Maze, and Aeqai. His work is currently on view in the public collection of the US Bank Center in Seattle. Stern lives and works in midcoast Maine.

 ARTIST STATEMENT

Trying to encapsulate a memory is not a linear effort. The collaging of several images suggests a muddled past as we look back into the layers of our life. Locations, objects, light and shadow, windows looking in and looking out. Perspectives shift and coalesce to create a somewhat mundane relationship, but one that is steeped in experience. Through stacking and collaging, I find a freedom in abstraction that is used to combine, contrast, and mold together pictures. Big swathes of space are created through meticulous details that offer a compositional moment of play. There’s a power in the quotidian nature of my subject matter. I hope the work will fulfill a similar function to that of portraiture, in that the evidence of a human life or experience is clearly present.