www.modernluxuria.com
Jay Dontae on the body distorted Intuiting the form of human abundance
Jay Dontae is a twenty-seven year old Edmonton based artist whose previous work in collage, photography, and film has riffed on the visual culture he grew up in: anime, video game art, hip hop culture, and fashion. He’s brought those insights to his work as an educator at the AGA and art course instructor in various venues around our city. But Dontae’s recent direction in painting has instead turned toward elemental human forms. Dontae points to a moment in his first trip to New York that profoundly reoriented his art. Having just visited some of the world’s most illustrious modern galleries, he exited those buildings desperate to achieve an art of permanence. On the street, he found himself captivated by a number of unadorned female mannequins in a shop window. In that moment it became clear to him that “one of the only timeless things in the history of art is the human figure.” Dontae returned home determined to delve into and contort the infinitude of raw feminine form. ▶
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