Jonas Wood

Drawings and prints by American contemporary artist Jonas Wood feature plant life, basketball, ceramics, and landscapes. Influenced by his surroundings, including people, interiors, and objects, as well as memory and art history, Wood creates artworks with intricate patterns and vibrant colors. 

Biography of Jonas Wood

Jonas Wood was raised in Boston, surrounded by impactful art that left a mark on his young mind. His grandfather's extensive art collection featured works by renowned masters such as Andy Warhol, Francis Bacon, Jim Dine, Larry Rivers, and Alexander Calder.

Wood's fascination with both the mind and art led him to graduate with a BA in psychology and studio art from Hobart and William Smith Colleges in New York. Early on, he delved into collage, using personal photographs of himself and friends. These early works had a darker quality that has since evolved. Following college, Wood pursued further studies at the University of Washington in Seattle (2002), earning an MFA in painting and drawing.

Wood's inaugural solo exhibition at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles in 2010 proved immensely successful, leading to numerous commissions. Notably, these included "Still Life with Two Owls" (MOCA), 2016, for the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, and "Shelf Still Life," 2014, for the High Line in New York.

The artist frequently develops series centered around subjects that captivate him, such as the "Pots" series from 2015, portraying vessels adorned with images from art history. Another notable series, "Clippings" (2017), features paintings of leaves, flowers, and stems. Recognizing his remarkable talent, the Dallas Museum of Art hosted a retrospective of Wood's work in 2019.

Today, Wood's paintings can reach seven-figure prices. He has exhibited globally, from Tokyo and Los Angeles to Beirut, New York, and Hong Kong. His pieces are held in various private and public collections, including the Museum of Modern Art, Hammer Museum, Whitney Museum of American Art, and Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago.

Jonas Wood's Art Style

Jonas Wood's distinctive style of composition features objects depicted with their own self-contained images. Each frame presents a meticulously balanced picture-within-picture composition. Drawing inspiration from artists like Alex Katz, David Hockney, and Henri Matisse, Wood's paintings combine drawings, photographs, and collage studies, resulting in layers of patterns, colors, and geometry.

Collaborating closely with his wife, Shio Kusaka, at their shared studio, they mutually inspire each other. Motifs from Kusaka's ceramics often find their way into Wood's paintings, and vice versa. Additionally, they draw from their personal art collection, which includes pieces by Magdalena Suarez Frimkess, Alighiero Boetti, Ed Ruscha, and Mark Grotjahn.