Jordan Kerwick
Yves beginning and end, 2021
Oil, acrylic, and spray on canvas
78 3/4 x 90 1/2 inches (200 x 230 cm)
© Jordan Kerwick; Photo by Argenis Apolinario
Jordy Kerwick is one of the hottest-selling painters in the art world – and a statement symbol for those in the know
Australian artist Jordy Kerwick, 39, is one of the fastest rising stars in the contemporary art market. Having sold his first paintings on Instagram back in 2015/16 for £100 each, his work can now command over £200,000 at auction. Like most of his gallery exhibitions, his latest, in the English Heritage setting of Wellington Arch, the grade 1-listed monument on Hyde Park Corner built to celebrate the Duke of Wellington’s victory over Napoleon at Waterloo, sold out before it opened. It closes on May 29.
Kerwick’s story began when he gave up his normal workaday life in Melbourne realising he was “the world’s worst businessman”, and took up painting “to cope with the stress.” Using cheap Chinese canvasses and his kitchen as a studio where he worked to the strains of Led Zeppelin and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, he threw 90 per cent of his early paintings away and gave the rest to friends.