Jason Butler Artist

Jill Silverman Van Coengraghts

My agent, friend and mentor passed away on July 16th 2022. Jill has been a big presence in my life over the last several years, she will be greatly missed. She had a truly extraordinary ability to understand the work and life of an artist, always knowing what to say with great sensitivity and intelligence. For the last two years, we were having video calls on a weekly basis looking at and discussing my work. It was a privilege to work with her and I will try to make sure I hold on to all the knowledge and wisdom she passed on to me.

‘One on One’

Here is a clip from a longer interview made possible by ArtHouse Jersey and kindly conducted by Jacqie Rutter. The full interview can be seen by following the link - https://vimeo.com/703269989

‘One on One’ - Exhibition anouncement

Capital House, St.Helier - 14th April - 2nd May 2022

As part of the pre-viewings of the exhibition in the week commencing 11th April 2022, Bénédicte Delay will be giving a talk and a question and answer session with Jason Butler to a private audience. Bénédicte is working with Jill Silverman Van Coegraghts of JSVC Projects.

The talk will be filmed and will be able to view online shortly afterwards.

Jason Butler - Detail of ‘Light in August’

Exhibition Announcement - ‘One on One’ in collaboration with ArtHouse Jersey

Capital House, St.Helier - 14th April - 2nd May 2022

I am delighted to be working with ArtHouse Jersey on a solo exhibition of my new work. It is a privilege to be opening the first show in their exciting new space at Capital House. There will be a selection of my latest work on display along with a large painting in a separate room which can be viewed by one person at a time for up to 20 minutes. The idea came through Tom Dingle at ArtHouse Jersey. He has been visiting my studio for the past 6 years and has always wanted others to experience the work as he has, with no distractions and with time to contemplate the work and let it reveal itself slowly.

20 minute bookings to view the ‘One on One’ painting can be made via ArtHouse Jersey’s Eventbrite page

‘Small Works on Paper’

I am delighted to be holding an exhibition of gouaches/collages in my studio space in July 2021. Many of the works have been in progress for the past two and a half years as part of my ongoing practice. It will be a great opportunity to see old and new acquaintances.

The exhibition will be open to the public from Monday 12th July until the Saturday 24th July, 10 - 17:30.

Kindly sponsored by Nedbank Private Wealth Ltd

PART I
For the past year, Jason Butler ‘s large abstract paintings have evolved beyond the array of colours and forms we have come to know as his language. Following an exhibition last year of expansive field paintings, sometimes as single works, other times as two- or three-parts panels, he began to reflect as only a serious artist can. What are the organising tenets of these works? How do the amassed collective body of colour and form hang together; where does their surface tension come from?
As part of this deeper reflection, he began last winter to make gouache and collage on paper, playing with these very forms and colours intuitively in a reduced scale, on a unified format that suddenly acted like a lens closing after shooting only in wide angle for a period of time. This combination of free-thinking analytics about the building blocks of his large scale works with the capacity to make many sequential works, like individual frames of a moving film ¾ suddenly generated a manifest group of works, of uniform small size, which can be read as a sequence that suddenly illuminates his highly distinctive method.
These collages appear then like an alphabet or a typology, or the variations available with a collection of Lego, or building blocks where a myriad of solutions can be found by simply moving and rejigging the visual accumulation of these torn parts. Before you know it, there are rows and rows of these collages and suddenly the logic and inner composition of Butler’s large-scale works seems clear in a new way. As if the skin of the fish has been removed to reveal the intricate meaty flesh with its elegant bones.

PART II
In this now expanded sequence of small works, each the same size as its neighbour, we see something else very musical in the evolution of what might have been just an exploratory exercise but in its being likened to a sketch book with accumulated uneven shapes and colours, it has emerged as a kind of dictionary of his content driven abstraction. The vernacular here is particularly his; we can clearly read it. These collages are engaging, sometimes comic, sometimes merry, each has a purposeful quality that comes when a very good creative force is present, approaching a serious concern with levity and open-handed candour.
When I first visited this studio overlooking the port of Jersey, he was painting in a way that presented figures tucked into the ground as if they were part of a picture that was both enigmatic and incomplete. It felt as if they were passing through in a rather fleeting tempo that couldn’t hold the eye; while the progression of planes he settled around them vibrated with meticulous calm. No matter how I tried, these works never settled before my eyes, but felt like a passage to something firmer and stronger.
In these years of pandemic, the paintings have solidified into coherent and discrete territory that reveals a new way of thinking about abstraction. This territory is as fresh as it is vibrant; surprising the viewer with its eclectic and personal approach to building the surface of a painting. The collages by contrast offer a short hand for Butler’s process and open the door to how he sees the inner world of these larger luxurious paintings. Having them splayed out on the wall is a wonderful feast, a banquet in fact. The eye is hungry for such moments of playful diversion especially in this time. This is his summer gift to us all.

Jill Silverman van Coenegrachts

In collaboration with ArtHouse Jersey

‘Sound of Colour’

Wednesday 24 October 2018: 'Sound of Colour' premiered as part of Jason Butler's exhibition, ‘Where Our Shadows Were'.
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In June 2018, ArtHouse Jersey introduced two artists: Jason Butler, a celebrated painter and Jack Chown, a former winner of Young Musician of the Year, who is now working in London producing music and composing. When Jack hears sound he sees colour and Jason listens extensively to music when creating his work.
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Working with film artist Todd MacDonald, Jack captured Jason’s movements as he painted and using an algorithm made it into a piece of music, effectively providing a way for Jason to compose as he paints. The style of the music is shaped by the work and responds to Jason’s studio playlist. ‘Sound of Colour’ premiered as an ArtHouse Jersey special event as part of Jason’s astonishing exhibition ‘Where Our Shadows Were' with a public performance on Wednesday 24 October2018.

‘Islanders’

In "Islanders," Jason will celebrate many of the diverse and intriguing individuals who contribute to island life by painting and drawing the faces of familiar and unfamiliar figures. By depicting people he comes into contact with in his daily life as an artist, the work will tell the stories of each subject.

This project is Jason’s way of portraying an island he has lived and worked in for most of his life.

Jason will open his studio every Friday, from 10am till 5pm so the general public can see the portraits and talk to the artist about the project.