Artist Statement

Ian Jehle's delicate, large-scale pencil drawings of friends, colleagues, and acquaintances examine personality from the second person perspective. In Jehle's words, his works ask whether a portrait is "an act of impertinence or tenderness or more likely something in between?" A combination of photographs form the source for Jehle's subtly executed pieces, a process which highlights how isolated impressions combine to form our notion of who a person is. The artist cobbles together disparate images into what is in one sense an idealized pastiche and yet reads as a fully integrated, "whole". By portraying those close at hand, these larger-than-life portraits present the viewer back to him/herself. The public setting further complicates our understanding of who is holder of the gaze.

Jehle, who is based in Washington, DC, received his BFA from American University and his MFA from Columbia University. Jehle's solo exhibition, Here's to You at Gallery-ef in Tokyo opened in November 2007. His recent group exhibitions include Me, You and Those Other Folks at Flashpoint Gallery, Washington, DC; Works on Paper, curated by Carter Foster of the Whitney Museum of American Art, at Long Beach Foundation of the Arts, NJ; the Artscape/Baltimore Museum of Art Juried Exhibition, 2005, curated by the BMA's Gary Simmons and Darsie Alexander; and Traveling with Gulliver, a group exploration of Gulliver's Travels, at the District of Columbia Arts Center. Jehle also convened and moderated the lecture series Who Do You Love at DCAC.