I am so honored to announce my participation in the Fall 2022 Visiting Artist Lecture Series at the School of Art + Design at the University of Oregon. Free and open to all! Lectures will be hosted in Lawrence Hall, Room 115, 1190 Franklin Boulevard, Eugene, OR 97403.
If you can’t make it, you can catch the live stream and recording of my lecture, A Psychedelic Dive into Art, Fractals, and NFTs HERE.
I’m delighted to have a feature and interview in the latest “Impact Issue” of Whitewall magazine! I discuss my inspirations, my adventures in digital spaces, and my belief that art should be for everyone. See the issue and read the interview here.
The Miami-born multimedia artist Jen Stark chose her path as an artist early on. Her grandfather taught her to paint seaside scenes dotted with boats, birds, and lighthouses before her “aha” moment came when painting her Cabbage Patch doll, Pamela. “At five years old, I remember thinking my painting was better than his, like, ‘Wow, maybe I can do this art thing!’” she recently told Whitewall.
After countless art classes as a kid, and later a degree from the Maryland Institute College of Art, she took a full-time job painting interior murals for Anthropologie before taking on her first paid mural project as an independent artist at The Sagamore Hotel on Miami Beach.
Stark has since moved to Los Angeles and has continued to explore the gravitational pull she has always felt toward color with dizzying, psychedelic sphere installations, 3-D optic sculptures, repetitive murals of dripping color, and trippy, patterned paintings. Previous commissions have ranged from the office walls of Facebook, The Surf Lodge, and The Standard Hotel to the music set of Miley Cyrus’s MTV Music Video Awards in 2015. In recent years, Stark has also collaborated with companies like Google, Vans, and Smashbox, cultivating a recognizable aesthetic that relies on geometry, nature, and emotion.
Ahead of releasing new NFT and digital projects later this year, as well as preparing for the second exhibition of “Cascade: A Jen Stark Experience,” Stark spoke with Whitewall about how her recognizable aesthetic was born, what’s keeping her inspired amid change, and how her work has evolved alongside developments in technology.
WHITEWALL: While your work has expanded, your psychedelic, geometric, and colorful aesthetic has largely remained. How did this originally come to fruition?
JEN STARK: A lot of my inspiration came from nature and my love of science and math. Growing up in Miami, I was surrounded by lush plants and a variety of colorful cultures. I was always fascinated by universal patterns in nature and felt this life force flowing through everything and decided to emulate that in my artwork. When I was in college, I decided to become a fibers major, which is a very open and conceptual major. We could explore whatever we were interested in as long as we were passionate about it. I was drawn to the work of artists exploring themes of repetition, meditation, and material, like Tom Friedman. He didn’t choose between being a painter or a sculptor—he would just come up with an idea and execute it with whatever material made sense.
There’s one particular piece that was an early inspiration for me—a construction paper sculpture of himself torn into pieces of paper, blood, and guts. I liked that he was pushing the boundaries with such a common material. My own exploration with paper began during junior year of college in 2004 when I studied abroad in the South of France. When I walked into the art store, everything was so expensive, so I decided to purchase a stack of construction paper—one of the cheapest I could find with the most potential. I wanted to see how far I could go in transforming it—turning this 2-D, everyday material into something 3-D and extraordinary. Around this time, my older sister was going to medical school, so I would browse through her anatomy books, seeing images of almost topographical dissections and layers of the body, which influenced me as well.
WW: What importance is color to you?
JS: Color has always been very important to me. It’s a huge part of my life, my career, and even affects how I dress. I try to surround myself with light and color constantly; it’s how I express myself and my world. I love how color can influence emotion and the patterns that it can create and the tricks that it can play on the eye. I have always been fascinated by the dichotomies of its role in nature, such as its attractive and repellent properties—like a bright red berry enticing you to eat it or a blue poison dart frog telling you to stay away.
WW: Your public art projects are consumed by people around the globe. What importance is this type of project for you?
JS: I see public art as a way to share my work with an audience who might not otherwise walk into a gallery space or museum. One of my favorite aspects of outdoor public art is that it’s out in the elements, interacting with the world around it. It’s so important to me to create artwork that all sorts of people can interact with. Art should be for everyone, not just museum- and gallery-goers.
WW: When did you know it was time to venture into the digital space?
JS: I minored in animation during college, learning the history and dabbling in some 2-D and 3-D animation software during those years (2001–2005). I gravitated toward creating meditative, handmade animations, and began creating stop motions of my hand-cut paper sculptures. In 2015, MTV asked me to create animations for the Video Music Awards, hosted by Miley Cyrus. I knew that I needed a digital animator to help build my vision in a short amount of time, so I was introduced to a super talented animator/artist named David Lewandowski, who came on board. That project was a huge success and my first big jump into the digital world. Then in 2018, I created an interactive animated projection for a solo show at Wilding Cran Gallery in Los Angeles.
The animation, Multiplicity, was done in collaboration with David Lewandowski and CutMod—who specializes in interactive installations. We projected the animation on a wall, and, as the viewer walked past, the shapes would rotate and change from black-and-white to color, emitting all sorts of musical notes. It was like an abstract garden that came to life with your movement. I love creating this kind of digital work because it’s more interactive than a typical gallery show, where touching the artwork is usually prohibited. It’s much more exciting to me to get the viewer involved and have them be a part of the artwork. For me, the best way to achieve these kinds of installations has been digitally.
WW: You’ve long since been using technology to create work, even posting “going digital” in an Instagram post in 2014. How is creating digital works today different than those you’ve created in the past?
JS: I’ve always been interested in pushing the boundaries and capacities of my own expression. Over the course of my career, technology has evolved, and my practice has evolved alongside it. I’ve learned a lot more about how to apply it to my aesthetic and have allowed my digital work to shift from 3-D animations of paper sculptures to interactive projections and NFTs. I’ve definitely gotten better at translating my vision more directly with collaborators as well.
WW: Can you tell us a bit about your foray into NFTs? What was your first work of that kind?
JS: I first found out about NFTs in early 2021. A friend of mine, Sam Borkson from FriendsWithYou, mentioned the word to me over the phone and told me to start looking into it, that it was going to be the future. As I learned about it, I loved the idea of artists having their own autonomy—with your artwork directly linked to you— and benefiting from royalties from secondary sales, which rarely happens in U.S. fine art auction houses.
I began researching, going on Clubhouse, and completely immersing myself for a couple of months before dropping one of my own. I knew that I wanted to adapt an animation that I had already created with David Lewandowski, so we decided to drop Multiverse, a 1/1 on Foundation, in late March 2021. This animation, with music by Jamie Vance, was loosely inspired by the interactive exhibit we had done years before.
WW: What have you enjoyed so far about working specifically in the NFT world?
JS: I really appreciate the level of autonomy that artists have. There’s such an incredible community offering news, guidance, and general information in this space. It feels like the beginning of a big movement, with this smallish community just sharing and helping each other learn. Outside of NFT networks, I’ve generally enjoyed working digitally because it’s so much more accessible. I can easily transform an entire environment and allow people to interact with my work in a way that I couldn’t achieve as easily with physical work. In September 2021, I created my largest installation to date, “Cascade: A Jen Stark Experience” in New York, which was six rooms of digital, interactive projections. This show helped propel my digital work to the next level, with the help of my talented collaborators.
WW: Last year, during a Clubhouse discussion Whitewall hosted with you on its panel, you spoke about what it’s like being an artist outside of the gallery model. Do you still feel like an “outsider”?
JS: I was never too interested in playing by the rules of the traditional art world. I’ve considered myself a bit of an outsider artist because I work with brands or choose not to lock myself into a particular medium. When deciding to work on a specific project, I always make a decision through a gut feeling on how it relates to myself and my art, without questioning, “Will the art world accept this?” Now that I’m in the NFT space, it feels really good to be one of the first artists to take the leap into a new movement. I’m surprised that there aren’t more involved by now, but I think that more and more will come into the space because it’s such a great tool for artists and their communities.
WW: Lately, in addition to companies and physical spaces, you’ve been collaborating with other artists, animators, and coders. What does collaboration bring to your work?
JS: It helps bring my work to the next level by utilizing techniques that are new to me. My public artwork and brand collaborations are another way to present my work to a new audience and help build things I wouldn’t be able to do on my own. It’s a way to amplify my work, through platforms, resources, and media that I don’t necessarily have access to solo. I feel the same way about the opportunities that come from my collaborations with other artists and creators. By exploring new avenues, techniques, and audiences, my artwork is able to continually expand and evolve.
WW: In an interview, you once mentioned, “I’ve always had a deep fascination for nature and how it relates to science and spirituality.” How does your relationship with nature today impact your relationship with art?
JS: My fascination with nature is deeply connected to the underlying mathematics of the universe, such as the fractal imagery found in everything from tree branches and nautili to the crest of a wave and the shape of galaxies. In my work, I want to explore the impact of these phenomena and discover the connections. I feel that so much of spirituality draws upon the laws and patterns of the universe, even relating to the afterlife. I think that nature is God, and it’s fascinating to take a deeper dive into everything that these types of examinations can open our eyes to.
WW: After many changes over the past few years, brought on by the pandemic, politics, and more, what’s inspiring you today?
JS: Inspiration can strike at any moment, and sometimes random ideas will come to me when I’m taking a bath or even waking up from a nap. Nature will always be a steady inspiration, but there are so many unexpected moments that can spark something for me—either while relaxing outside of the studio, traveling to a new place, or meeting new people. I think that a lot of my current interest in immersion and interactivity has been influenced by the fact that we are able to socialize and inhabit public spaces more freely than at the start of the pandemic. I’m so excited by the idea of sharing my work with people who can physically interact and immerse themselves within my work and share that experience with other visitors as well.
I am honored to be on the cover of Scholastic Art’s September issue, “Color, Shape, and Rhythm.” As a child, I always looked forward to reading and viewing Scholastic zines, so am thrilled to come full circle as an interviewed artist inside of one. A Q&A can be found inside along with a poster of one of my paintings.
See the full interview below.
Scholastic Art: When did you first know you wanted to be an artist?
Jen Stark: I was probably 4 or 5 years old. My grandpa was a hobby artist, and he would invite me over for art lessons on the weekends. That was a big source of inspiration for me.
SA: Was there a moment that led to the artwork you’re known for?
JS: When I was a teenager, my older sister was in medical school. I would flip through her anatomy textbooks, looking at the photos of dissections and all the crazy layered diagrams. Then I had a turning point while I was in college. I was trying to save some money, so I decided to purchase the most affordable art material I could find, which was a stack of construction paper. I brought it back to the studio, and I started doing a kind of dissection. I really liked the idea of transforming a common material like paper into something unexpected.
SA: Where do you find inspiration now?
JS: My inspiration comes from color theory, designs in nature, even math equations like the golden ratio and the Fibonacci sequence. For example, I’m interested in how the spiral appears in nature, like a snail shell or a galaxy.
SA: How do you translate your observations into a visual language?
JS: I think of my work like an abstract version of evolution. There are different generations, and one informs the next and then informs the next, slowly evolving and changing. And eventually it turns into this big collection of different shapes.
SA: How do you think about color?
JS: I love working with rainbows, and I have very specific rules about what colors should be next to each other. I usually put warms next to cools and lights next to darks, which helps make the color pop. I like juxtaposing different colors and seeing how they react with each other.
SA: Is there a relationship between your paintings and your sculptures?
JS: I like to have a few different projects at once, and I love to paint. Sometimes the sculptures inform the paintings, and the paintings inform the sculptures. The paintings are almost like 2-D translations of the sculptures.
SA: Why did you start making public art? Why is public art important?
JS: I started with an outdoor mural at a hotel in South Beach, Miami, where I’m originally from. That opened the door to the next one and so on. I love making public art because it gets me out of the studio. My body is more involved, I’m outdoors, and I'm painting these big shapes. I also love public art because a bigger audience can see it. People who may not go into galleries or museums are able to view the work.
SA: What challenges have you faced? How have you overcome them?
JS: Being a woman artist has been a challenge. We have to do a little more to get ourselves out there. Sometimes when people hear I’m an artist, they ask what my real job is. People probably wouldn’t ask a man those questions. To overcome that, I just try not to listen to the noise. I’m pretty stubborn, and I just go for it.
I am excited to have my newest vinyl mural installation in Demi Lovato’s “Shroom Room,” along with a sculpture and print of mine. Architectural Digest did a tour and interviewed Demi about her new home. Watch the full video and read the interview here.
Cosmic Cuties is a collection of 333 unique PFPs created by Jen Stark. These hypnotic characters are animated using an analog process, lovingly created with gratitude for friends and supporters. Cosmic Cuties radiate positive vibrations that will guide you to realize the infinite potential within.
“The Miami-born multimedia artist Jen Stark chose her path as an artist early on. Her grandfather taught her to paint seaside scenes dotted with boats, birds, and lighthouses before her “aha” moment came when painting her Cabbage Patch doll, Pamela. “At five years old, I remember thinking my painting was better than his, like, ‘Wow, maybe I can do this art thing!’” she recently told Whitewall.
After countless art classes as a kid, and later a degree from the Maryland Institute College of Art, she took a full-time job painting interior murals for Anthropologie before taking on her first paid mural project as an independent artist at The Sagamore Hotel on Miami Beach.
Stark has since moved to Los Angeles and has continued to explore the gravitational pull she has always felt toward color with dizzying, psychedelic sphere installations, 3-D optic sculptures, repetitive murals of dripping color, and trippy, patterned paintings. Previous commissions have ranged from the office walls of Facebook, The Surf Lodge, and The Standard Hotel to the music set of Miley Cyrus’s MTV Music Video Awards in 2015. In recent years, Stark has also collaborated with companies like Google, Vans, and Smashbox, cultivating a recognizable aesthetic that relies on geometry, nature, and emotion.”
Continue reading here.
I am thrilled to be featured in POPLIFE’s The P.O.P. Issue 006. Photos by Rudy Dubuoé.
So excited about the launch of my second collaboration with Avant Arte.
Shape Shift is part of a limited edition of 50 lenticular prints. Each print is mounted on a custom aluminum backing and comes with its own bespoke wooden box.
“Hypnotic colour and structure bloom and pulse in Jen Stark’s Shape Shift. The artist’s first large-scale lenticular combines formal and organic shapes to create an optical patchwork collage, translating her digital animations into physical form. The lenticular lens allows the print to change when viewed from different angles. Striking sunset gradients, vivid shapes found within a garden and rich hues of underwater sea life all act as starting points for Stark’s dynamic process – an encyclopaedia of disparate geometries.”
- Avant Arte
Shape Shift, 2022, PETG lenticular lens on 3mm aluminum, backing, 18.1 x 26.8 x .8 in. Edition of 50.
To mark the launch of my second collaboration, a lenticular print edition called Shape Shift, with Avant Arte, I hosted a live studio visit on Collective at 12pm PST on July 22, 2022.
It was so much fun to share my space with everyone who joined the livestream! If you didn’t get a chance to tune in, you can watch the full tour and Q & A here.
I am honored to be included in the latest Trespassing III auction held at Christie’s starting July 8 and ending July 21 at 10:42am EDT. My piece, Light Box #2, will be on view at Christie’s Rockefeller Center Galleries in NYC from July 13 - 21.
For details on the auction, click here.
In addition to the auction, I am a speaker at Christie’s Art+Tech Summit. This two-day conference hosted in their NYC gallery brings together creators, collectors, industry leaders and more, continuing Christie's commitment to lead the dialogue about the role and impact of technologies in the art world. Find tickets here.
Christie’s is pleased to announce the third offering of Trespassing, a groundbreaking online sale curated together with Ronnie K. Pirovino, the Prints and Multiples and Post-War and Contemporary Art departments. The sale traces graffiti’s influence on contemporary art and embraces the energy and humor of artists inspired by the medium. The auction has consistently achieved record breaking results for artists such as Katherine Bernhardt, Edgar Plans, and KAWS. Trespassing will feature works across collecting categories by leading names such as KAWS, Banksy, and Invader and will also juxtapose works by Hajime Sorayama, Javier Calleja, Shantell Martin and Roby Dwi Antono that share the same dynamic spirit. Trespassing will also feature a special group of artworks curated by 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair. Together with Inna Modja, 1-54 has curated a selection of three 1/1 NFTs by digital artists Inna Modja, Andre O’Shea, and Moon, Sun, Diamond. In collaboration with Code Green, 1-54 has announced that a portion of the proceeds of these NFTs will go to the Great Green Wall project, which aims to restore the continent’s degraded landscapes. Also included in the auction are 1/1 NFTs by Skygolpe, Joshua Davis, Blake Kathryn, FVCKRENDER, and GMUNK.
Porch Gallery has teamed up with Art Blocks to feature my Vortex series. Opening reception Thursday, May 19th, 8-11 pm. Exhibition runs through June 17th, 10 am-10 pm daily. Porch Gallery 3306 Park Ave, Minneapolis, MN 55407
Happy to announce I’ll be speaking at VeeCon on Sunday, May 22nd from 12:15pm-12:45pm CT on the “Physical to Digital “ panel located at Polaris– 5 Yard Line. Featuring artists GREG MIKE, Brilly, and myself moderated by Jenny from the Blockchain. Our panel will discuss the dynamics of working in both the digital and physical space.
VeeCon is a multi-day conference with discussions and performances from iconic and emerging leaders in NFTs and popular culture. The event is a first of its kind NFT ticketed conference for the Web3 community to come together and build lasting friendships, share ideas, and learn together. Click here for more information on tickets and attending.
The nft now podcast recently interviewed me about NFTs & how they changed my life as a traditional artist. Listen & watch below:
Jen Stark is a mixed media and NFT artist who broke records in March 2021 for being the first female artist to enter Foundation’s top 10 selling creators. For the past fifteen years, she’s worked with a variety of mediums to bring her mesmerizing paintings, sculptures, and animations to life. She’s collaborated with brands like Apple, Google, Vans, MTV, and Smashbox, and even launched a 6,000 sq. ft. immersive installation, “Cascade” in 2021. Her first generative NFT collection, “Vortex,” made its debut in December 2021, immortalizing her signature paper sculpture style on the blockchain. Though she came from the traditional art world, Stark believes that NFTs have changed her life and will be the new avenue of art history.
In this episode we cover:
- How NFTs allow artists to better connect with collectors
- How the traditional art world views NFTs
- Her advice for other artists
- Equitable representation in the NFT space
- Art in the metaverse - And much more!
So excited to share my mural process in this time lapse video.
Chromatic Ooze, 2021. Commission at Ivy Station in Culver City, CA.
Chromatic Ooze #1, 2021, FL 05 East, Ivy Station, Culver City, CA
Chromatic Ooze #2, 2021, FL 05 East, Ivy Station, Culver City, CA
So honored to celebrate the amazing Kip Thorne for King Kong Magazine’s “Kings & Queens” Issue 12, Autumn/Winter 21.
Kip Thorne is a Nobel Prize winning astro-physicist with a passion for using art and science as a way of communicating his work. His work reaches out from the university laboratory to Hollywood and beyond. His groundbreaking work into Black Holes is both awe-inspiring and yet he manages to help us relate to their importance through fact and almost magic. The fact is the magic is in the facts themselves.
I am pleased to announce my newest NFT collection, Vortex.
My first Art Blocks Curated project is an interactive, generative NFT collection featuring 1000 iterations coded with specific parameters regarding color palette, edge details, number of layers, tunnel styles, and more. Each Vortex is created upon minting by the collector. You can see examples of vortexes generated during the testing phase below. For more information on the project, visit jenstark.com/vortex.
Bidding starts Monday, December 13th, 2021 at 10am PT/1pm ET on the Art Blocks platform.
The phenomena of the spiral is located throughout the natural world, found in everything from nautili and galaxies, to fractals and sacred geometries. Much like the gravitational pull of patterns in the universe, Jen Stark's series of generative vortexes pays homage to the intricate systems present in our daily lives.
Drawing upon the aesthetic practice of her signature paper sculptures, Stark's hand-cut techniques are translated to adapt and evolve within the digital realm through code, brought to life through harmonic sine waves.
I am pleased to announce my latest solo exhibition at Wilding Cran Gallery in Los Angeles...
Light Spectrum
Nov. 13 - Dec. 23, 2021
Featuring new vibrant, multi-layered, psychedelic works ranging from sculpture and painting to light installation and interactive animation, Light Spectrum aims to conceptualize the mysterious visual systems of pattern, light, and color that govern our everyday lives. You can learn more about the exhibition here.
“My work focuses on the exploration of color theory through light and juxtaposing pigments. I'm interested in how light can be invisible to the naked eye, while at the same time containing a variety of colors. Everything around us, including ourselves, holds an entire rainbow of color.”
- Jen Stark
I am excited to announce my newest mirrored acrylic installation, Geometric Spectrum, at the law offices of McDermott Will & Emery in New York City. This installation features a colorful geometric patterned mirror measuring approximately 11 feet tall and 40 feet wide over two walls. Special thanks to Tiffiny Lendrum & Area Architecture for making this project come to life.
Cool Hunting featured my latest solo show Cascade on their website.
“Extended through 7 November, the immersive exhibition Cascade: A Jen Stark Experience populates 6,000 square feet of space at Williamsburg, Brooklyn’s The William Vale with swirling rainbow patterns, charming projection-mapped icons, dripping and drizzling digital walls and so much more. Stark’s four uniquely artistic rooms and two moving murals come to life thanks to cutting-edge technology. Produced by Art Market Productions in partnership with Joshua Liner Projects and United Talent Agency, the dazzling endeavor begins with Flavor Paper wallpaper and ends with a gallery of fine art pieces and a gift shop that includes accessible Stark merchandise. In between, the LA-based visual artist’s mesmerizing work—along with contributions CutMod, animator Christopher Rutledge, CG artist TJ Pulliam, Jamie Vance, artist and filmmaker David Lewandowski and sound designer Charlie Scovill—yields a tremendous sense of awe and discovery for individuals of all ages.”
Click here to read the rest of the article written by David Graver.
