Justin Richel

Justin Richel’s primary focus is painting. His works largely consist of gouache on paper and range in scale from small intimate paintings to sprawling wall works. Behind the confectionary palette of Richel’s portraits of colonial fellows, seductive pastries and Victorian furnishings are narratives of control and chaos replete with incisive social commentary.

Richel received his BFA from the Maine College of Art in 2002. In 2004 he studied the technique of Icon painting at the Franciscan Monastery in Kennebunk, ME. Richel has exhibited his work throughout the U.S. and Europe and recently had a solo exhibition in Stuttgart, Germany and a two person exhibition with his wife Shannon Rankin at June Fitpatrick Gallery in Portland Maine. He was a Fine Arts Work Center fellow during the winters of 2005-06 and 2006-07. His work has been exhibited in many group exhibitions at various museums and art centers including the DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum, the Ogunquit Museum of American Art, the Wadsworth Antheneum museum of Art, the Center for Maine Contemporary Art, the John Michael Kohler Art Center, the Fitchburg Museum of Art and the Institute of Contemporary Art in Portland, Maine.