Casey Kaplan
Jordan Casteel
By Chelsea Weathers
April 2019
Two portraits placed early in Jordan Casteel’s first solo museum show, in her hometown of Denver, feature sitters in nondescript environments. Mom, 2013, employs a muted palette. The background is beige, with plum stumbling in the upper corners; the absence of background details focuses the viewer on the figure. Casteel’s mother sits in a wooden chair, her eyes closed, head resting on her folded hands. Her face is a delicate patchwork of tans, browns, and grays, the scarf or sweater in her lap a complex, gestural pattern that repeats in the jewels of her bracelet. She doesn’t acknowledge us; we are observing a moment of quietude, rest, and contemplation. The more recent portrait, Twins, 2017 conveys another mood entirely. Two toddlers, one clad in red and the other in pink, a Minnie Mouse blanket draped across their laps, are strapped into a double stroller and sit facing the viewer. Exuberance is conveyed via the perky polka dots of the stroller’s hoods and the cotton-candy-pink backdrop—which gives only the slightest nod to a space beyond the foreground. The baby on the left is fast asleep, his relaxation evident all the way down to his dangling fingers and feet. The child on the right, by contrast, confronts the viewer with startling self-possession.
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