Jaylon Israel Hicks

Jaylon Israel Hicks

Jaylon Israel Hicks (b. 1993, Houston, Texas, USA) is an American artist who lives and works in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Hicks is a conceptual artist who experiments in a range of media, including but not limited to drawing, painting, sculpture, and photography. While Hicks’ art often focuses on everyday objects, exploring themes of globalisation and connectivity, his works are not austere or mundane. On the contrary, they are emotionally charged documents of contemporary life – they dwell on the self-destructive impulse which has come to define the Anthropocene. Hicks’ focus is nature, however unlike his Land Art predecessors his definition of the natural world is expansive, encompassing urban landscapes and the humans who occupy them. While Hicks is pessimistic about the fate of the earth in the hands of corporations, he is sympathetic towards the needs, hopes and dreams of individuals. The warmth, understanding, and grace Hicks lends to fellow humans and non-humans guides the character of the work – in which the wasteful and sublime sit uncomfortably side by side. Currently a student of Material Science, Hicks’ scientific pursuits influence his artmaking, pushing him to work to investigate and understand the significance of each material he brings into his multifaceted practice.

In March 2023, Maximillian William, London presented Hicks’ debut solo exhibition Gothica. Hicks’ previous solo exhibition Wilt was mounted in a Kaboom Books in Houston, TX, 2015.