Chicago native Jeanette Diaz is a self-taught artist whose work lives between observation and intuition. Educated in Fine Art Photography and design at Columbia College Chicago, she approaches portraiture as a personal meditation on beauty—one shaped by emotion rather than perfection. Influenced by classic painters known for their fearless use of color, her work carries echoes of the Fauvist spirit, marked by emotional intensity and a vibrant, expressive palette.
Working primarily in oil and oil pastel at mid-scale to large formats, Diaz creates richly layered paintings that offer a contemporary interpretation of the portrait tradition. Her work explores the idealization of storytelling and beauty, drawing from docudrama-style photographs rooted in her lived experiences. These images serve as the foundation for her subjects, which are often placed in intimate domestic settings. Within these spaces, she blurs the line between reality and imagination, rendering her figures through a figurative to semi-abstract lens.
At the intersection of photography and painting, Diaz translates photographic moments onto canvas with the sensitivity of a painter. She begins by documenting meaningful experiences through her camera, then reimagines and personalizes them in oil paint, allowing each piece to evolve into a process of self-reflection and discovery. Her practice is driven by a deep passion for color and its ability to carry emotional weight and psychological resonance.
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