Sasha Bogojev on Jason Boyd Kinsella

A quick glance at Jason Boyd Kinsella’s works deciphers the familiar form of a human figure, which then instantly dismantles into an amalgamation of flawless, colourful and otherworldly shapes that construct the initial mirage. These geometric fragments, which the Canadian artist uses as building blocks to represent the complexity of the human condition, simultaneously evoke our reliance on digital technology and its influence on our psyche. It is this focused interest in the human psyche that resulted in Kinsella’s work being labeled as hyper-contemporary psychological portraiture, allowing him to create an endless amount of assemblages which symbolise the endless combinations of character traits we are all built from. With the purposefully obvious use of technology and 3D rendering software in Kinsella’s creative process, the reference to interconnectivity between the natural and the artificial becomes even more relevant and somewhat personified.

The whole idea of creating a family album of different personalities stems from a very early age when the artist’s mother gifted him a book, Please Understand Me, which used Carl Jung’s psychological classification theory to enable readers to determine which one of the 16 existing character types they are. Painfully accurate, the notion that our uniqueness could be reduced to 16 distinctive personas was somewhat shocking and stuck with the young Kinsella to this day, feeding his interest in the “self” and what defines it. With time, he realised that each of these characters do vary to a big extent, depending on how the constructive elements are put together. This realisation influenced the way he was visualising his own theory, which, informed by his personal and professional interests, developed into the idiosyncratic synthesis process at the core of his current artistic practice. Later, by understanding the fragility and inconsistencies of our physicality, whether through ageing, surgery or smartphone filters, the artist was compelled into conceptualising ways to portray his subjects, from the inside out, abstracting the raw materials that build us. The era of social networks and their effect on the deliberate construction and projection of different personae has intensified the artist’s interest in disregarding the way in which we have reduced ourselves to Avatars and Icons. Instead, Kinsella depicts the sitter’s more obvious physical attributes, fixating on our individual psychological fingerprints.

The final concept Kinsella is working with today was moulded by a complex assemblage of diverse influences that he has experienced on a professional and personal level. The sculptures of Pablo Picasso and his fearless and driven urge to explore the unknown have been a significant influence on Kinsella, but this influence often gives way to the primitive and tribal art he discovered on his frequent travels around the globe. Growing up surrounded by exceptionally simple 8-Bit graphics and his current environment in Norway, which is characterised by simplicity, minimalism and functionality, have drawn Kinsella to the reduction of a subject to its basic, core marks. At the same time, his practice revolves around portraying existing people, whether his friends, acquaintances or a stranger who has somehow influenced him. This interest in biomorphic qualities and an enjoyment of the “feel” of the artwork rather than a compulsion to understand it, has certainly set the path for the body of work that comprises Kinsella’s major London debut, which also experiments with elements of augmented reality and 3D printing.

On a technical level, Kinsella’s masterful oil paintings are created using a mix of traditional methods and modern tools. Starting off with a drawing, Kinsella proceeds by finessing his concepts with 3D software, playing with the way that the light interacts with each block. Once he achieves a format that recalls the human face or the bone structure, he proceeds to render the image in oil on canvas. Having studied and revered the classical techniques of Old Masters, Kinsella’s futuristic-looking portraits are created using traditional painterly methods, from heavy and vigorous to delicate and silky blending. Appearing entirely digitally rendered, the visuals reveal, upon closer inspection, the qualities and the appeal of conventional hand painted works. With visible brushstrokes or occasional linework imperfections, these portraits bring the human element to otherwise meticulously perfect compositions, accentuating the artist’s main goal to create an accurate and honest portrait of the fragmented self.

Sasha Bogojev, March 2021.