Artist Statement

Throughout my 35-plus year career as an artist, my work has most often been described as expressive and dark. I agree with the former term, but have always chafed at the latter. In my mind, a work of art is only truly “dark” when it indulges in some form of schadenfreude or morose delectation. A large proportion of my work deals with dark themes, but I gain no perverse satisfaction from creating or presenting it. Instead, I use my work as an attempt to find empathy and pathos for the subject, no matter how “dark.” Empathy and pathos, however, have been hard to come by these past few years. As a result, many pieces in my new body of work are visual reports on the pervasive climate of fear and anxiety that I sense around me. With these reports I am attempting to make use of the raw feelings and come to some form of understanding.

Catalog Available

Artist James Deeb presents “The Ghosts on the Shore,” a catalog featuring paintings and drawings created between 2016 through 2021, including a large number of works created during the pandemic and the aftermath of the last election cycle. This volume includes over 40 reproductions and an introduction by the artist.

Preview and order The Ghosts on the Shore at MagCloud.

New Interview

I was recently interviewed by Artwork Archive about the meaning behind the monsters…
Read it here.