532 Gallery Thomas Jaeckel presents Diary, an exhibit of mixed media work by Stefan Szczesny, renowned German painter and sculptor. The pieces on display, called “photo-paintings,” combine two related areas of the artist’s creative endeavor. Since 1985, Szczesny has been making images that integrate photos taken in a variety of settings with figure studies rendered in his characteristically expressive style. The result of the juxtaposition of realistic, photographic imagery with the abstract, painterly records of the artist’s hand, cause the viewer, at first glance, to pause—has Matisse returned to us, reincarnated as a graffiti artist? Far from it! The French artist’s influence as a draftsman is apparent in the work, but Szczesny’s clever extension of the figure into realistic, photographic space is unique—and surprising.

A look at Szczesny’s method bears this out. First, he takes personal photos of friends, family, and familiar places. Then, he enlarges the photographs to an intermediate size. Finally, he approaches the enlarged photographic print with paint (black, red, white or gray) and overlays figurative elements onto the picture. The drawings are reminiscent of the artist’s much-exhibited, signature steel cutouts of exotic nudes. Painted flat black, those pieces have an immediate, possibly jarring impact. Here, the full effect on the viewer is less immediate. Szczesny tricks the eye, taking the intimate scene, and making it something else. A quiet corner of the world (perhaps first recorded in a photograph taken in one of the artist’s frequent jaunts to the Island of Mustique) is distorted or re-configured by Szczesny’s brushwork. Now, the image is not simply a record of a time and place; it’s a new, often witty, experience that may be timeless, and a picture that plays games with space. As we move through the gallery, it’s tempting to chuckle, and why not? There is a lightheartedness in this work, confirming Szczesny’s growing place in international art as an optimistic icon-maker as well as a political iconoclast. Through Diary, 532 Gallery Thomas Jaeckel invites viewers to look again at the commonplace, and to see it through the seasoned, playful, idiosyncratic eye of Stefan Szczesny.