source: facebook

Jaz Harold is a New York based fine artist. Her recent works are generally soft and inviting, using plush fabrics and yarns in pastel hues; they incorporate sexual undertones (or overtones) and themes of self reflection or inner dialogue. She finds certain subjects or materials to contain inexplicable nostalgia, and repeats these visuals throughout her work.
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source: mocoloco

Jaz Harold is a fine artist / illustrator who has a taste for surreal, pastel worlds with a hint of the grotesque. Originally working in 2D, Jaz has been actively pushing her work into the physical realm, creating abstract 3D sculptures that are subtle due to their colours yet striking at the same time. Over a late night coffee at SuperCore, I met up with Jaz to chat about what she’s been up to.

” I studied at the School of Visual Arts as an Illustration major. Right after graduating I did some illustration jobs, a bunch of photo retouching, and ended up doing work for photographers and fine artists. Eventually my own work turned more towards fine art than illustration. I guess it was based on the influence of the people I was working with. I like three dimensional better. I think it is easier to work with. When I work in 2D, because of my background in illustration, I always feel it has to have a specific narration to it which ends up making it a bit cliché. I give too much information. Working in 3D I feel I don’t have that same inclination and an artwork can just be what it is. So I can make art that’s a little more interesting because I’m not over explaining it. Actually I ended up doing that piece because I’ve been drawn in by certain fiber art I’ve seen. The ones that have yarn that is layered, textured and dripping down. I think those are really cool. Looking at those I wanted to something like that, maybe a combination of that and fabric. I was sketching a composition that I would like and then figuring out the material. Getting a lot of samples and figuring out which ones I liked.”
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source: artistaday

Jaz Harold was born in and raised in Monroe, CT. In 2004 she moved to New York City to attend the School of Visual Arts, and graduated with honors in May 2008 earning a BFA in Illustration. She has remained since in New York working as a freelance illustrator and gallery artist.

Jaz’s work thrives on the combination of contradictions; the cute with the creepy, the beautiful with the macabre, the horrific with the humorous, and the corrupted with the innocent. She has a series of lovable, huggable, squishable stuffed animals, embroidered with reminders of mortality, and designed to stash one’s pills. A different run of works focuses on childhood icons in horrific situations; ‘My Little Ponies’ have turned to cannibalism in one such painting, while ‘Rainbow Brite’ awakes to her horse’s decapitated head in another. Her works in various mediums have been displayed in galleries in New York, Connecticut, and Genova, Italy.