James O’Keefe Desert Hard-Edge Painter

The paintings of James O’Keefe (Chris to friends – a long story) pair a tender brushstroke with the hard-edge use of juxtaposed color. He reinvents the use of the outer frame, incorporating it as a sculptural element. O’Keefe identifies as a minimalist artist, so everything for him is about the pure use of color and pared-down design. By reducing the components of a work and taking a less-is-more approach, the artist notes that for him, “there always seems to be more and more answers to find.”

After 30 years spent living and working on the rainy Oregon coast, O’Keefe and his wife Nan were looking for a dry place to spend the winter months. After a trip to Arizona, they detoured through the California desert town of Joshua Tree. They happened to stop in front of a real estate office and an art supply store. Nan checked out the art supplies, and Jim walked into the real estate office.

It was 2009, and the mortgage crisis was in full swing. They were able to purchase a bank-owned lovely all-season house on three acres with mountain views. They now spend their summers in Oregon and winter here in Joshua Tree. In 2011, James built his desert painting studio and joined the local Joshua Tree Art Gallery (JTAG), a cooperative artist venture.

He first explores new ideas with his sketchbook, creating working drawings and a loose framework of ideas. Later, he reviews his sketchbook with a fresh eye to determine which would make effective paintings. In the past, he would build the surface of the painting and its shape first and then begin to think about color. More recently, he has been selecting the primary color first and experimenting by tinting it in different directions before he constructs the structural elements.

These are the more routine aspects of his process. On a deeper level, the artist’s process is about taking a deep and well-considered look at all stages of image-making. He explains that “in painting, (the work) involves shape, color, paint application, texture, and dimensionality.” Any one of these disparate elements can inspire the ultimate direction of the finished piece.