Jamar usually portraits Charleston, SC on medium and large scale canvases. For Charleston Supported Art, the artist thought it would be interesting to create 32 unique cityscapes of Charleston on a rather small scale with as much detail as his usual, larger paintings. Jamar expressed enjoying this new process as it required a different approach (to paint 6 by 8 paintings).
Fred Jamar has been painting for 50 years. His favorite medium by far is oil. He likes to experiment with new textures and techniques, sometimes putting brushes aside in favor of a knife or trowel. He typically composes as he applies the paint, with perhaps just one or two lines penciled on the canvas to guide him. Jamar is enormously prolific, with over 100 works completed in the past year alone. He has had several solo exhibitions at local galleries. You can find his work locally at Robert Lange Studios.
His recent work has been dominated by Charleston cityscapes – not seen, however, with the traditional eye. The sky is generally very dark, inky “Prussian” blue, and starless. The trees are assembled color masses, balloon-like in appearance, and the buildings are intensely vivid in form and color, an impression heightened by the overhanging darkness. The paintings are bright – but also lonely. The mood is stock-still. Most have no human or animal figures. It is as if Edward Hopper painted an abandoned carnival at 3:00 AM. They are brilliant.
FEATURED WITH:
Mariah Channing
Olivia Cramer
Miyako Fujiwara
Jennifer Henriques Phillips
Kristi Ryba