JJ Baker

JJ Baker is an artist and educator from Cincinnati, OH. His work examines materiality and memory through visual exploration. From finding objects and surfaces as subject matter to collaging layers of paper and paint onto canvases, JJ continues to push the possibilities of painting. He is a constant traveler and his trips throughout the Americas and Europe inform his work. JJ is a passionate educator and will continue to teach after graduation.

In his work, JJ Baker illustrates the paradox of time through two series of paintings: the Readymades and the Excavations. The Readymades hide narrative and meaning behind deadpan paintings of found objects painted on found surfaces. Acknowledging the trompe l'oeil tradition, the Readymades function as both an illusion of an object and an object itself. The Excavations challenge the relationship between memory and images through abstraction. In these process-based works, he builds an image from collected paper ephemera only to erase or “excavate” the painting. Destruction breeds creation, transforming objects and images into manifestations of memory.