Kevin Darmanie: Jack & Jill

Stair-gazing Gallery
January 24–June 4, 2023

The Art Center’s Stair-gazing gallery showcased Jack & Jill by figurative painter Kevin Darmanie. Born in Trinidad & Tobago, Darmanie utilizes photographs of himself and his friends to create his portraiture, referencing elements of his own life and shared experiences to inform clean narrative works which explore complex relationships between image, object, gaze, and landscape. In Darmanie’s recent work, the cellphone’s function as a contemporary mechanism for interpersonal communication looms prominent, informing the composition of the artworks and acting as the de facto device to capture the depicted images.

Kevin Darmanie, Jack & Jill, 2022, Acrylic on canvas, 67 x 55 inches