Menu
The New Contemporary Art Magazine

Gregory Jacobsen’s Repulsive, Vibrant Narratives

Gregory Jacobsen’s unsettling, vivid oil paintings offer portraits, scenes, and bizarre explorations of the most unflattering aspects of our anatomy. The Chicago-based artist sometimes abandon the figurative, instead offering a vague, writhing mash-up of organic materials. All are rooted in the artist’s fixations and sense of humor.

Gregory Jacobsen’s unsettling, vivid oil paintings offer portraits, scenes, and bizarre explorations of the most unflattering aspects of our anatomy. The Chicago-based artist sometimes abandon the figurative, instead offering a vague, writhing mash-up of organic materials. All are rooted in the artist’s fixations and sense of humor.

“I paint figures, focusing on the little bits that obsess me…a little flab hanging over a waistband, ill-fitting shoes, overbites, noses, teeth, and flesh,” the artist says, in a statement. “Either through portraiture or busy tableaux, I create a world and vocabulary of characters that live and embrace their so-called faults. Over the years, this work has developed into piles that are corpulent and visceral stand-ins for characters. Meat, junk, pasties, and genital-like fruit and vegetables are constructed into heroic yet pathetic towers. These piles also act as a sort of forensic evidence and cataloging of awkward sex, gross gluttony, ridiculous masturbation rituals, and endless humiliation and failure.”

See more work from Jacobsen below.

Meta
Share
Facebook
Reddit
Pinterest
Email
Related Articles
Toronto-based artist Kyle Stewart crafts oil paintings that blend introspection and a relationship to place. He created the above oil painting for the upcoming group show “Nexus,” arriving at Thinkspace Gallery on Nov. 5 and running through Jan. 7. Much of the artist’s work tackles themes of memories and changing backdrops. In particular, you can see how Stewart remembers a rural existence and the tension of reconciling a newer existence in the city.
Sometimes, massive leeches are simply just that: massive, gross, disconcerting leeches. Melbourne-based artist Beau White crafts oil paintings that may appall or at the very least, unsettle viewers. But he says that his love of “illustrating absurd, grotesque and distastefully humorous images” goes way back to his primary school days. But in general, there aren’t lofty statements to be made in these works.
Amanda Greive's oil paintings contain both conversations about gender and the history of art itself. Using feminine iconography and abstraction, she injects intrigue into her realistic works while maintaining a consistent elegance and absorbing quality.
Naudline Pierre's paintings offer a look into both a broader spiritual plane and her own "personal mythology." The paintings, intimate and otherworldly, explore the vibrant and unseen. The artist's ghostly oil paintings has been shown in New York City, Los Angeles, London, and beyond, and she is a a recipient of the Terra Foundation for American Art residency.

Subscribe to the Hi-Fructose Mailing List