LOS ANGELES, CA.- Over The Influence is presenting The Juice Is Loose, an exhibition of new works by LA native Jonni Cheatwood. In his second solo exhibition with the gallery, Cheatwood continues to explore figuration, using it as a tool to invite viewers into an intimate dialogue that examines both the artist and viewer's inner world, bonding us through universal lived experiences.

In this series, Cheatwood takes his practice to a much more personal and vulnerable level. Working off family photographs and personal stories, much of the scenes and imagery resemble experiences from the artist's life and family history, imbuing the work with a sense of authenticity and reliability. The title of the exhibition itself is a play on words that references the pop culture that Cheatwood grew up within, adding an extra degree of nostalgia to these visual vignettes of the artist's life.

Cheatwood’s practice is a labor-intensive process, sewing canvases with found textiles that reference both interior and exterior spaces. As these canvases are stretched the different fabrics create unexpected textures and shapes, adding a further level of abstraction. As viewers attempt to distinguish between the painted canvas and the printed textile, they are drawn in, finding themselves encompassed by the large-scale canvas and scenes.

As Cheatwood dives deeper into figuration, his loose brushwork and gestural abstraction subtlety convey the full range of emotion experienced by the subjects in his portraits, as well as the viewers of these scenes. The texture of his brushstrokes combined with the sharp lines of their forms has allowed the artist to create characters that are at once unrecognizable while still universally relatable.

As a self-taught artist, Cheatwood’s process is one of experimentation and steady evolution over time. It is a dynamic undertaking that spans mediums and aesthetics, creating textured and color-filled pieces that greet the viewer head-on, ready to engage in conversation.

Cheatwood was born in 1986 in Thousand Oaks, CA, USA. He attended Arizona State University. He currently lives and works in Los Angeles, CA, USA. Cheatwood has been exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions globally including at the Rema Hort Mann Foundation, New York, NY, USA, and at various galleries internationally.