The Jury Award is given to the artist with the highest jury score. Jesse Reno describes his process as an idea growing out of a mess that gradually takes on shape and meaning. The personal history of the painting becomes clear to him: he paints and scribes it within the layers and sometimes on the back. With an air of the shaman about him, Reno works on many paintings at once in a fluid style.
Reno had been drawing and making music throughout his youngest years, and turned to words at about 16. A bandmate’s brother’s paintings “blew his mind” at 25, and now he says he can’t imagine what he’d do if he couldn’t paint. He still plays music and writes.
In the latest series of paintings by Jesse Reno shamanic beings struggle to find their place in a world simultaneously on the verge of expanding and collapsing. Totem animals and Native American figures reverberate memories of people who once lived as one with nature.
Media: acrylic, mixed media 2D
Website: www.jessereno.com