Jeff Soto

Since a young age Jeff Soto has been captivated by the visual arts. He credits early exposure to the work of artists Mercer Mayer and Patrick Woodroffe as stimuli for his creativity. When he was 15 he began to dabble in the art of graffiti, which he credits as a major influence in his art. His artistic influences are too many to list but include Van Gogh, Paul Cadmus, Lisa Yuskavage, Twist, Otto Dix, Georganne Deen, Alex Gross, Manuel Ocampo, Margaret Kilgallen and the Clayton Brothers (to name but a few). Jeff's work has been shown in galleries across the US, and recently in Europe. He graduated with Distinction from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California. In his spare time he likes to sleep in with the wifey, look for aliens at night, read comics, take crappy photos, and nurture the always growing cacti farm.

Jeff Soto creates visual mythologies with his ominous, quasi-divine apparitions, whose organic tendrils writhe from the cavities of their smoking, robotic shells and whose lumbering frames preside over sprawling urban landscapes. Dramatic lighting, textural richness and a sophisticated palette are also his hallmarks. His sculptural sensibility and improvisational, grafitti-informed method of working is often showcased through his magnificent "wall clusters", which are an amalgam of disjointed storytelling and playful formalism. Without fail, Jeff Soto's work manages to be both streetwise and fanciful.