Jason Stopa stands a head taller than most of us and shares some strong ideas about contemporary art with a calm, intellectual confidence. His work, too, is raw, but the delivery system is mellifluous — a world of familiar references and a range of intimate painterly touches.
We met in his Gowanus studio, and after a couple hours of intense conversation, I stood up to leave, taking one last look around. Without thinking, I ran my fingers down the edge of a canvas, along which bottle caps were attached. Stopa’s work — and his writing on art— pushes us to react to the tactile and sensate, in a world where virtual experience trivializes it.
His paintings deconstruct the signified object — M&Ms, a watermelon, a basketball hoop — into the painterly, the felt, the tasted. His marks run the gamut from loopy, gestural strokes, to wiry ropes of paint tracing geometric forms, to small illusionistic details. They reference ubiquitous brands as well as private narratives.
Stopa received his BFA from Indiana University and his MFA from the Pratt Institute. He is currently the subject of a solo exhibition at Hionas Gallery, on view through April 25th. He has also had solo exhibitions at Novella Gallery (2014), John Davis Gallery, Hudson, New York (2013), and Kent Place Gallery, Summit, New Jersey (2013). Stopa is also a curator and a frequent contributing writer for Art in America, The Brooklyn Rail, and Whitewall Magazine. He teaches at Pratt Institute and the School of Visual Arts.
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View the full interview at hyperallergic.com
