Marcus Jahmal

Turning to your new exhibition at Anton Kern Gallery, can you share a brief introduction to the work? I’m particularly interested to hear about the subject matter of the new paintings and color.

The new show is about color as a subject. The colors took me on a journey in the studio and led me to paint a myriad of different motifs. It was a building process, almost like a mind map where you have one subject, and you try to figure out what that makes you think about. You paint that next and keep building associations and connections between seemingly unrelated topics. It’s a process I’m using to make the work and try to find its meaning once it’s all there on the canvas: the meaning of the individual work and the totality of all the works in the show. There are matador bullfighting scenes smashed into interiors, and I thought it would be interesting to have bullfighting but claustrophobic. It was a fun and sometimes distressing process. There’s a commonality in the show of violence, strength, and sexuality; I wanted to be more vulnerable with this exhibition. There are animals that feel more human. Either I’m self-referential, or I like to print images out of specific subjects. I search for images I want to see and steal them. Around my studio, I have tons and tons of art books and poetry books, and they undoubtedly influence the work.