"My work is autobiographical in nature and inspired by personal experiences that reflect elements of quiet observation, public spectacle and human relationships."
Justin Terlecki is an artist living and working in St. Paul, Minnesota. Originally from Youngstown, Ohio, Terlecki graduated from Youngstown State University in 1997 earning a BFA in painting and printmaking. He has exhibited his work regularly in the Twin Cities since moving to Minnesota in 1998. In 2009, Justin received a Jerome Fellowship for Emerging Printmakers through Highpoint Center for Printmaking. This fellowship funded a series of prints inspired by his travels to India and Spain. His current work explores the relationship between memory, loss and communication. Terlecki’s work is included in the permanent collection of the McDonough Museum of Art and many local and national private collections.
Artist Statement:
I create autobiographical narrative paintings that portray recollections of daily life, from the mundane to the quietly extraordinary. Personal photos and sketchbook entries serve as references to recreate the mood of real places through texture, light, and shadow. Figures inspired by people from my life occupy these settings as they engage in search, observation, and introspection. Although these works appear still and serene, exaggerated perspectives and visual cues of tension evoke the dreamlike state between familiar and unreal – that foggy feeling of recollection.
The idea of private worlds inherent both to human connection and to the individual mind are central to this body of work. The title, “Hidden Place,” refers to those private worlds, which are continuously built from physical environments as well as mental states and chance discoveries that seem to pause time.