ChrisTeddyP

Chris is a mutlidisplinary artist, architect and painter best known for his large scale portraits of everyday heroes of black culture. Born in Newark, NJ, he earned his BA from the Pratt Institute School of Architecture. Jordan’s early work consists of abstracted portraiture that speaks to mental health and the black gaze and is inspired by his own battles with mental health and the duality of being a black & queer artist. In all of his work, Jordan combines a wide range of references from Harlem Renaissance literature to pop culture. He developed an early interest in portraiture and its connection to the plight of his community, particularly the work of artists such as Kara Walker, Kehinde Wiley and Yayoi Kusama, and draws much of his inspiration from contemporary culture. His series ‘Colored’, for example, is an ode to blackness and its constant dissection under the world’s stage. Jordan uses well-known Negro features, which are often shunned in their natural state but very much commidfied, of bell pepper noses and full almost ‘swollen’ lips (soup coolers) and marries them with eyes that display overwhelming emotion. Over the course of his career, Jordan’s work has evolved and become more politically driven and paints portraits that incorporate the cultural imagery that surrounds him, as he believes it is the artist’s responsibility to reflect the times.