Perrotin is pleased to present Jason Boyd Kinsella’s first solo exhibition in France. Jason Boyd Kinsella’s first solo show in France will debut a new series of paintings, highlighting the artist’s continued exploration of the ever-changing state of being. 

Born in Toronto, Canada, Jason Boyd Kinsella (b.1969) lives between Oslo, 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 Jason Boyd Kinsella’s practice. Fascinated by the complexity of human nature, he breaks down the personality traits of his characters into distinct geometric units whose shape, colour and size define their individuality based on the Myers-Briggs personality test. “My visual language telegraphs this impermanence by illustrating our existence 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. After sketching a drawing, he elaborates the color scheme with 3D software and then renders it in oil, applied to canvas, where the brushstrokes and the tiny imperfections in the pictorial layer are deliberately left visible to highlight the craftsmanship behind his work. 

“Each colorful building block is open to new combinations of elements – like some visual alchemy.”

Tridimensionality is key to Kinsella’s practice. Deeply influenced by sculpture, design and architecture, Kinsella’s geometric shapes interact with the surrounding space and provide a multitude of perspectives from which to observe the subject, going beyond the two dimensions of the medium. As the digital era allows people to switch between multiple identities with an ever-changing physical appearance, Kinsella anchors 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 and Design Museum of Los Angeles, USA, and at Nassima Landau, Tel Aviv. His works have recently joined the Nassima Landau Foundation in Tel Aviv, the Azman Museum in Malaysia, and the Long Museum in Shanghai.