Collection: David Jester

I generally paint ten hours a day—sometimes more—and cannot imagine a life without art. For years I was in the business world, dreaming of painting; today I am grateful to be able to devote myself fully to painting every day. About nine years ago, I left the corporate world, taught myself oil painting, and started my first series about seven years ago.

Aside from a brief foray into plein air painting, I have mostly explored the topic of being gay in my artistic work. I believe we all want to see ourselves represented in art, and I feel I offer a perspective that is rather rarely shown. While my earlier works focused on the feeling of social exclusion, today the focus is on aging within the community. Our culture rarely deals with aging and the development of feelings over time—both internally and externally. Therefore, I consider this to be an important and legitimate topic that goes far beyond the aspect of sexuality.

I have worked in various disciplines—from printmaking to painting—but I earned my degrees (BFA from VCU and MFA from Rutgers University) in sculpture. I currently live in San Diego, California, where I devote myself full-time to painting. Over the past seven years, I have created a series of 200 oil paintings depicting men in swimming pools; another 50 works have already been created for the current series.

My work has been published in books and magazines, and I even won first prize at an event held at the WTC some years ago. Recently, a Danish company published a monograph about the "Pools" series and my current work. The Leslie-Lohman Museum also holds a work of mine in its extensive collection.