Jake Longstreth reduces his images to their basic elements.  His flat, light-filled paintings stray liberally from the photographs they are based on, inhabiting a middle ground of painterly subjectivity. Faithful adherence to the observed world is not Longstreth’s goal, as he explains: "Painting can be useful in that it simplifies, revealing the abstractions of our current condition through a discerning lack of detail." Indeed, his pictures omit as much information as they provide, while still corresponding to the weight of experience. Such expressive limitations show evidence of the restraint in Longstreth’s vision: his work resists itself, stubbornly showing what is – all it is – in an abiding quietude.

EDUCATION

2005    MFA California College of the Arts, San Francisco, CA

1999    BA Lewis and Clark College, Portland, OR

SELECTED EXHIBITIONS

2008

• Gregory Lind Gallery, San Francisco, CA (solo)
• Group Show, EgoPark Gallery, Oakland, CA

2007

• Real Space, Mahan Gallery, Columbus, OH

2006

• Wabi Ranch, Gregory Lind Gallery, San Francisco, CA (solo)
• James Chronister and Jake Longstreth, Gallery of Urban Art, Emeryville, CA
• Material World, Alliance Française, San Francisco, CA

BIBLIOGRAPHY

• Valdez, Sarah.  “Jake Longstreth,” Art in America, May 2007
• Leaverton, Michael.  “At Home on the Range,” SF Weekly, January 17, 2007
• Baker, Kenneth.  “Landscapes, real and imaginary, seen in the light of day,” San Francisco Chronicle, January 6, 2007
• Helfand, Glen.  “Jake Longstreth,” Critics’ Picks, artforum.com, December 2006
  

PUBLICATIONS

2008   New American Paintings, West Coast Edition, Cambridge, MA

2005   New American Paintings, MFA Annual Open Studios Press, Cambridge, MA

AWARDS AND RESIDENCIES

2008    Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant

2007    Artist in Residence, Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, Nebraska City, NE

2004    Murphy and Cadogan Fellowship Award