Megan Helms
Reporter
Twenty-five elaborately colored pieces of art that fill the white gallery emit a light and warmth not normally found in San Francisco.
Jesse Allen, born in Nairobi, Africa and raised in Kenya, was never formally taught to paint, yet his paintings display the animals and landscapes of Africa in a fantastical way using vibrant colors and swirling patterns. Looking at one of Allen’s paintings is like figuring out a puzzle consisting of intricate symbols and stories.
Allen left his job as a French and Italian language instructor at Stanford University to pursue his work about 40 years ago and his art, which has been shown all around the world, is now on display at Chandler Fine Art and Framing downtown on Yerba Bueuna’s Minna Street.
Animals symbolize innocence, sexuality and power, and Allen makes water and animals move on paper with the use of lines surrounding them. Trees are shown as if they were cut in half with lines running up and down the trunks like veins and moons coincide with the number of mammals in the pictures. Allen’s art is not just a picture, but an illusion of life.
Intricate details appear throughout Allen’s work making viewers look long and hard at the pieces. A tiny snail crawls along the side of the painting, a minute detail that most observers would likely miss.
Speaking over five languages and being well versed in the literature of more than one of those languages adds to the depth and imagination of his work.
Some of the more unique pieces among the collection at Chandlers are small pictures of brightly colored animals in their strangely colored surroundings on scraps of paper.
Allen creates full pictures on the fragments of paper, only showing the small part that fits on to the scrap leaving the viewers imagination to create the rest.
The artist keeps scraps of paper from previous pieces and uses them to find inspiration. Raised where there was no electricity and supplies were scare, saving paper is vestige of Allen’s childhood.
Although Allen works on six to eight pieces at a time, each work is unique, though it displays the same basic elements of re-imagined African wildlife in brilliant colors. Even the prints of some of his favorite pieces are unique with pencil touch ups and signatures done by Allen to perfect the printings.
The exhibit at Chandlers creates a sharp contrast to the grey city street on which the gallery is located. Walking inside the large white room, one is taken from the sometimes dreary streets of San Francisco to a vibrant and beautiful re-created Africa.
Allen’s work is on display and on sale just until May 30. For more information visit http://www.chandlersf.com .
