Oakland, CA-based artist Jessica Hess is a hyperreal landscape painter. Her depictions of the urban environment both celebrate and validate the art of graffiti through a fine art lens of oil paintings on canvas and gouache on paper. Her awe-inspiring paintings have a powerful, dramatic, and captivating energy that feeds a desire to know more about the person behind the work. It was a pleasure to connect with Jessica to discuss her art and future projects.
Thank you for agreeing to this interview. Congratulations on your career so far and thank you for sharing your amazing talent. Firstly, how did you become interested in the arts and choice of mediums?
I always knew I was creative, even as a young child. I remember drawing with family members at three or four and got enrolled in a watercolor class by the time I was five years old. By eleven I had lessons painting in oil and had my father’s Minolta camera on permanent loan by 15. I learned to draw, paint, sew and print my photographs in a dark room all before I left high school. I had very supportive parents.
I started devoting my time to oil painting as a teenager and found it easiest to work with. It is a patient and forgiving medium. I liked how classically respected and serious it was for a kid.
Who are your influences? Is there a particular artist who stands out and if so why?
I enjoy the paintings of German artist, David Schnell. He’s able to create and breakdown architecture in a single image. His colors are bold and harmonize well, they hold my attention longer than most other work. I also have the mentality of a collector when looking at work too though. A good example of this influence can be seen in the photographs of Bernd and Hilla Becher. We share an industrial aesthetic, water towers, coal hoppers, etc. Except they photograph them formally like portraits and their consistent style makes great collections.
You’re a graduate of Rhode Island School of Design. Please share your experiences of attending the School and how far it shaped your approach to painting.
Attending RISD was like joining the circus and enrolling in the military all at the same time. It was intensely challenging but I also never had more fun. It was crazy and intense, however, I knew how to paint before I got there because I had taken art very seriously, making it my every extracurricular and waking moment from an early age.
I didn’t really find my subject matter until after graduation. I was an illustration major and was taught how to frame work that way. I learned how to fulfill deadlines and make a body of work from that point. I was never as interested in participating in the painting department. It felt very structureless to me.
You’re a recipient of the Trent Burleson Painting Prize, the Faber Birren National Color Award, and the Stamford Art Association Award for Excellence. To date, which accolade are you most proud of and why?
I was recently awarded a major grant from the newly founded Svanne Family Foundation. That grant shone some light into a dark year for me and got me refocused on being in the studio. It really fed my artistic practice in a significant way.
‘Out of Sight’ and ‘Murphy Hike’ are just two of your powerful oil paintings. Please share with us the concepts and your process of creating these wonderful pieces.
Both of those pieces have a touch of urban sprawl, they are newer works where I am introducing more elements of nature. Those pieces were created with the intent to look at the interfacing and contrast of the graffiti and the natural landscape. Anything can be a canvas to street artists. It is interesting how one can go out into nature and find graffiti works, I enjoy its seeming displacement outside of the urban environment. Besides that, it’s beautiful to paint a natural landscape with so many “unnatural” colors within the tagging and murals.
The most recent works focus on the obliteration of the graffiti through pixelation in the landscapes. I photograph my subjects and landscapes and then hand paint the pixelated elements where the graffiti was in the original scene. The most recent work raises questions around free speech and censorship.
You have several compelling paintings but I’m particularly drawn to your ‘door series’ of murals. Please tell us more about this, and your attraction to doors.
Thank you for asking about that series! The door series is my longest ongoing series of paintings that I’ve been working on since 2007. The works go back to my collector mentality and again bring to mind the photography of the Bechers. Similarly, I am presenting the subjects in a consistent format and creating a collection in which the doors are all the same, but different. They’re essentially portraits of doors that I present in the same size and composition every time, the only thing that changes is the door itself and sometimes its embellishment.
Doors are interesting, there is so much variety in design and function. They also tend to get tagged a lot so that adds a lot of texture. Bernd and Hilla Becher talk a lot about form and function. I also gravitate towards structures that are engineered rather than designed, my doors are both functional and beautiful.
Are there any particular artworks you are most proud of and why?
I think my most recent works are the most successful. My favorite painting to date has got to be ‘Static Interference’ from January 2020. It was one of the first in the new series exploring censorship through pixelation. I’m untethering myself from the work of other street artists. I’m able to imagine and place different elements more freely in the work and make better compositions. I had always tried to be true to what other artists had put into those spaces and the censorship gives me more freedom in a way to input different components.
What is your biggest challenge as a visual artist?
The art market. It can be frustrating that most artists’ success is tied to commercial viability. Unfortunately, visual artists aren’t always judged by the quality of their work.
What advice would you give to young artists embarking on their careers?
Don’t. I should’ve been a marine biologist, my sanity suffers on a daily basis being an artist. But I feel compelled to make work because it’s who I am and what I’m best at. Being an artist is hard and everyone’s path is totally different and completely subjective. It’s deeply personal yet wholly public. Sigh.
What are you currently working on?
The pixelated series is where my interests currently lay with my studio practice. It feels like a more mature body of paintings stepping out on my own without relying on graffiti to be the primary appeal. I think I got bored of collaborating with other artists.
Where can our readers find out more about you?
My Instagram will provide insight into my studio practice and my website has a full archive of past work. Hashimoto Contemporary is my primary gallery and most of my work is available through them.
Note: please provide website and social media links
Website: www.jessicahess.com
Instagram: jessicahessart
Images: Jessica Hess photo by Dustin Cantrell
Artworks ‘Out of Sight’ and ‘Murphy Hike’, courtesy of Jessica Hess
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