JASON BOYD KINSELLA

Born in Toronto, Canada, Jason Boyd Kinsella (b.1969) lives betweenOslo, Norway and Los Angeles, USA. After receiving a BFA in 1993,Kinsella decided to break from his painting practice. However in 2017,he returned to painting, following a 30-year hiatus.

Unveiling mankind’s psychological makeup lies at the heart of JasonBoyd Kinsella’s practice. Fascinated by the complexity of human nature,he breaks down the personality traits of his characters into distinctgeometric units whose shape, colour and size define their individualitybased on the Myers-Briggs personality test.

‘My visual language telegraphs this impermanence by illustrating ourexistence as a delicate assemblage of shapes unbound by flesh.’

If the clean surface of Kinsella’s paintings may recall the Old Masters’works, his aesthetic and methods are resolutely contemporary. Aftersketching a drawing, he elaborates the color scheme with 3D softwareand then renders it in oil, applied to canvas, where the brushstrokesand the tiny imperfections in the pictorial layer are deliberately leftvisible to highlight the craftsmanship behind his work.

‘Each colourful building block is open to new combinations of elements– like some visual alchemy.’

Tridimensionality is key to Kinsella’s practice. Deeply influenced bysculpture, design and architecture, Kinsella’s geometric shapes interactwith the surrounding space and provide a multitude of perspectivesfrom which to observe the subject, going beyond the two dimensionsof the medium. As the digital era allows people to switch betweenmultiple identities with an ever-changing physical appearance, Kinsellaanchors his subjects in the essence of their psychological attributes,revealing who they truly are.

‘Any semblance of permanence is an illusion.’

Jason Boyd Kinsella’s work was exhibited at the Architecture andDesign Museum of Los Angeles, USA, and at Nassima Landau, TelAviv. His works have recently joined the Nassima Landau Foundationin Tel Aviv, the Azman Museum in Malaysia, and the Long Museum inShanghai.