Jonathan Crow Artist Talk

Jonathan Crow is a Santa Clara-based artist whose background in film heavily influences and shapes his work. Crow’s experience combined with oil as his primary medium come together in exploring form, color, and tension to create pieces that are reminiscent of stills from movies.

Jonathan Crow’s exhibition, Cul-de-sac, consists of a curated collection of paintings that combine the quiet, unassuming stillness of suburbia, with moments of dark and unsettling humor. These scenes in his paintings draw inspiration from Edward Hopper, Richard Diebenkorn, and the films of David Lynch.

In many of these scenes, there is a “growing unease” or “some menace that looms just outside the frame,” as Crow explains, which also brings forth conversations of vital topics including race, gender, and the complicated nature of living in America.

This event gives you the opportunity to meet the artist and learn more about him and his work, while viewing the artist's current exhibition at the Triton Museum of Art.

This event is free and open to the public (including free parking).

Born in Ohio in 1971, Jonathan Crow received his MFA in Filmmaking from the California Institute of the Arts in 2003. Before turning to painting, he spent many years working in the film industry—a background that continues to shape the cinematic atmosphere of his work.

In 2013, following a career shift, Crow returned to his early love of drawing. His series Veeptopus—portraits of U.S. Vice Presidents with octopuses on their heads—became an online sensation and was featured in BuzzFeed, The Huffington Post, and The New York Times.

Since 2018, Crow has focused primarily on oil painting, developing a body of work that explores the uncanny beauty and quiet tensions of Southern California suburbia. His paintings—at once humorous, unsettling, and deeply observed—draw inspiration from Edward Hopper, Richard Diebenkorn, and the films of David Lynch.

Crow’s work has been exhibited throughout the Bay Area and beyond, including Arc Gallery (San Francisco), the New Museum Los Gatos, Marin MOCA, TAG Gallery (Los Angeles), and the de Young Museum.

Crow is currently based in Santa Clara, California.

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