Today we’d like to introduce you to Jerry Weiss

Hi Jerry, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?

My father was an accomplished cartoonist and my mother was a portrait and still life painter. They met in the same New York art school where I later studied, and now teach. My dad met many of the great illustrators of the early 20th century and amassed a museum-worthy collection of their work. All this served as a backdrop to my youthful interest in art—I drew from childhood and started painting in my teens. When I left high school, I began taking classes in figure drawing from life. I was fortunate to learn from some inspired teachers—including Roberto Martinez in Miami and Harvey Dinnerstein in New York—and I spent vast amounts of time studying the masters from books and in museums, especially the Metropolitan Museum of Art. By my early twenties I’d left art school and was working independently. I painted other artists and anyone who would pose voluntarily, or I drove around the New York metro area, looking for landscape to paint. This all unfolded at a time when figurative painting was still out of fashion and plein air landscape painting was something of a rarity as well.

At first I worked in a New Jersey apartment I shared with a fellow artist, then I shared a studio in New York City. There were several shows, the first in NY when I was in my mid-20s, and I began taking on portrait commissions. I spent the better part of one summer painting on the streets of New York, primarily near the East River. In 1994, I accepted a teaching job at a small arts college and moved to rural Connecticut, which led to more time painting rural landscapes. For the past twelve years I’ve commuted from Connecticut to the Art Students League of New York, where I teach life painting and drawing. I also write about art for multiple publications.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?

This career is one of constant challenges. It’s difficult to earn a living as an artist. Fashions change and novel and superficial images often attract attention. Art is treated as a commodity. It seems that galleries and art institutions expect the artist to handle promotion on social media and find patrons on their own.

Whatever the practical and financial challenges of being an artist, there is a tremendous satisfaction in the acts of drawing and painting. That personal satisfaction is vital, because there are periods when you will receive little attention and scant positive feedback, so the creative will must come from within.

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?

I draw and paint the portrait, figure and landscape from life, which suggests a traditional mindset. But life work encourages direct engagement with the subject, with all the fugitive conditions of light and mood that entails. That’s a lively business, and my line drawing and brushwork must display an energetic response to the person and the atmosphere I’m painting. I’m not trying to copy what I see, nor am I interested in replicating surface elements—AI is doing that quite well already. Rather, I’ve always desired to adapt a traditional skill set to the interpretation of modern life. The artist walks this curious line—the creative life allows you to withdraw socially and work in solitude, yet it also is our way to engage with the world.

At any rate, drawing was my first language, and I’ve been lucky to practice it with fluency. And I love finding colors that suggest the semi-transparency of skin and the dense greens of summer foliage.

We all have a different way of looking at and defining success. How do you define success?

Success in art is, in large part, being true to one’s perceptions. The American painter George Inness said that the artist’s role is to cultivate their own spiritual development, and I can’t think of a more admirable motive for the artist.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jerrynweiss/

Image Credits

All artwork and photos courtesy the artist