Champaign-based artist , Paul Kenneth has worked to perfect his unique style of painting for the past 15 years. He has been included in group shows at LVL3 Gallery, Mana Contemporary, NEXT Art Chicago, Heaven Gallery, MOUNTAIN Gallery, Zg Gallery, and solo exhibitions at Jackson Junge Gallery and 26Twenty Gallery. Paul received his BFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago and is currently pursuing his MFA from The University of Illinois. He recently completed a month-long residency at The Vermont Studio.
Using painting as a stage, my artistic exploration focuses on the theatrical performance of mark-making. Quick gestural marks dance around intricately rendered representations. Sweeping brushstrokes become animated and develop personalities through delicately drawn graphite outlines. Upon first glance, the figurative subjects in my work appear as the leading roles with the marks and materials playing the rest of the cast . Time spent with the work wi ll reveal the pictorial hierarchy turned on its head. The figures begin to undulate in and out of abstraction as the at tent ion to the marks takes center stage. The resulting image hovers in playful flux between abstraction and realism.