Jay Shinn

“Room With a View”

September 21, 2024 – January 11, 2025

Dallas-based artist Jay Shinn recognizes that “early experiences and interests circle back around and play an important part of who we are as adults, even more so through the art we make.” Shinn embraces early artistic influences of mentors, Op Art and Geometric Abstraction artists, construction, and neon signage in his current work. The fascination and incorporation of neon light, including its optical effects on the space and objects around it, guides Shinn in his creations. 

These creations include constructed sculptural objects as well as shaped canvases and panels with painted surface treatments. Shinn’s incorporation of neon lights emphasizes the visual impact of light, pigment, and design. Works on paper hint of the gradations that often occur with an artificial light source that simultaneously distorts, contradicts, and enhances a physical form. 

Shinn describes his installation within Room With a View as “the juxtaposition of a jail cell to a hotel room, so similar, yet so different. A view is important to me, either a view that inspires or simply a lifeline to the outside world. The many windows in the cells provided a place for the eyes and minds of those incarcerated to wander into new thoughts. I hope that now with the art inside these cells, the visitor has another view that allows their mind and senses to travel to a new place.” 

The 2024 Cell Series of exhibitions is generously supported by the National Endowment for the Arts, Paula & Parker Jameson, and the McGinnis Family Fund of Communities Foundation of Texas, with additional funding from Jay & Barbra Clack, Kathy Webster in memory of Charles H. Webster, and Dr. Larry Wolz. 

JAY SHINN, Paradise Central Proof 2, 2019, 6-color lithograph created with neon light, 27.5 x 27.5 in. Courtesy of the artist and Barry Whistler Gallery, Dallas.