BIOGRAPHY

A native New Yorker from Roosevelt Island, Jason formally trained in the theatre and designed lighting for stage plays, musicals, dance, and jazz concerts in NYC venues, summer theaters as well as national tours to performing arts centers.

Over time, Jason’s main focus returned to capturing images on 35mm film where he abruptly picked up from promising work begun in his teens. An avid explorer, subject matter fluctuated equally between urban and rural settings then finishing off decades later with jazz and street portraiture. Jason composed photographs in both black & white and color dictated by the seasonal changes of natural light fortified with a theatrical sensibility.

On the flip side, Jason’s painting skills were kept sharp by regularly freelancing as a scenic artist Off Broadway in addition to keeping sketch books on hand while idle in hotels and airports. In the early 2000’s Jason painted a small number of studies utilizing identical materials to his current works but confined to linear and mosaic formations.

Always on the go, Jason concurrently worked as a teaching-artist for public and private institutions. In 2007 he founded the photography program at the Harlem Children's Zone / Promise Academy then on to A.H.R.C. to establish a studio art curriculum for adults with developmental disabilities. His years spent in occupational ‘day-habs’ fortuitously lead to the creation of his first cohesive series of mixed media paintings entitled SLABS: ten freely carved and thickly painted recycled plywood panels.

Since their debut in 2013 as a solo exhibition at Topaz Arts in western Queens, these large naturalistic abstract microcosms have shown regularly in commercial and collective galleries throughout the city. In 2018 Jason was awarded a yearlong residency at Bliss on Bliss Studios which begat a second solo exhibition through ChaShaMa in midtown Manhattan. Jason is also an active member of the Plaxall Gallery in L.I.C. which functions as a nurturing arts organization.

Until recently, Jason had a beautiful industrial sized art studio located just off the 59th Street Bridge, in Queens, which succumbed to a developer’s wrecking ball; he now spends his days ensconced in his apartment finally producing over 30 years’ worth of photographic images.