Brad Kunkle is an American painter born in Lehighton, Pennsylvania, in 1978.
“The use of gold and silver in my paintings serve two main functions — the first being symbolic. Gold and silver serve as symbols in many ways but to begin with, they are ‘material’ symbols in harsh contrast to the spiritual or intangible aspects of life.”
Brad Kunkle earned his BFA from Kutztown University in 2001, where he studied under George Sorrels, a student of the 19th-century academic painter William-Adolphe Bouguereau, and his work explores themes of shedding dogmas, intuition, and the power of feminine energies as guides for seeking enlightenment in symbiosis with the natural world.
Brad Kunkle spent his younger years exploring the sparse countryside and deep forests of rural Pennsylvania, and he was drawn to the worlds of Maxfield Parrish and the Pre-Raphaelites, where a subtle, supernatural beauty seems to be hiding under the breath of women, and where something beyond natural perception is waiting to be found.
Brad Kunkle felt confident in his ability after his academic training, but he was stifled by the structure of schools and dissatisfied with the boundaries of traditional imagery, so he worked as a commission-based portraitist and began an almost decade-long journey of continued self-instruction and independent study to discover his own artistic sensibilities.
Brad Kunkle searched for an unnatural quality in his paintings, and he found it by reducing his processes to the elements of painting that felt most natural to him, and his minimal palette is inspired by the grisailles of early European masters and the haunting quality of antique photographs and daguerreotypes, which have a mysterious quality that he also carries into the way he treats objects or dresses.
Brad Kunkle worked as a decorative painter in his mid twenties, leafing entire walls in copper, and he was beguiled by the shifting, life-like nature of the surfaces, so he began to incorporate gilding in his work, which fulfilled the unreal quality he had been looking for to convey his moody, romantic ideas of human nature and ritual.
- Born in 1978 in Lehighton, Pennsylvania.
- BFA from Kutztown University in 2001.
- He is known for his use of gold and silver leaf in oil paintings.
- His work explores themes of intuition, feminine energies, and symbiosis with nature.
- He lives and works in New York City.
Brad Kunkle’s work is internationally recognized for its unique use of gold and silver leaf, which serve both symbolic and aesthetic purposes, and the shifting of the leafed skies and wallpapers symbolizes the ever-changing world we live in, while gold itself represents the controversy and malleability of human values.
Brad Kunkle has become internationally known since selling out his debut solo exhibition in New York City on opening night a decade ago, and his work continues to captivate audiences with its blend of contemporary themes and classical techniques, reflecting his deep connection to the natural world and the power of feminine energies.
Art Category Fact: Gilding is a technique of applying a thin layer of gold, silver, or other metal leaf to a surface, and it has been used in art for thousands of years, from ancient Egyptian and Byzantine icons to medieval altarpieces and Renaissance paintings, with masters such as Cimabue, Duccio, and Gustav Klimt employing it to create luminous, otherworldly effects that elevate the spiritual and symbolic qualities of their work.
“Art is not what you see, but what you make others see.” — Edgar Degas