Joel Simon

Joel Simon is a very talented versatile artist. An award-winning animation director, in recent years he has also successfully developed his career as a painter. His work has been featured at high profile shows in Northern Ireland, including at the Royal Ulster Academy exhibitions and the Belfast International Festival.

Making a transition from digital media to oil painting, Simon became fascinated with the idea of capturing and conveying his subjects’ stories, personalities and emotions using this new medium. Simon depicts iconic portraits and intriguing figures. His subjects are often anonymous people, who placed in glamorous or everyday contexts, become the protagonists of his works, unique characters with an interesting story to tell. He draws inspirations from contemporary artists, and famous painters of the past, as well as popular sources, such as old-fashioned portraiture of Hollywood’s golden era and mid-century fashion magazines.

‘For my compositions, I favour simple gestures while my subjects’ expressions convey their deeper emotions. I strive for elegance, naturalism and a mixture of fine detail and broad vivid strokes which brings the oil medium to the fore. In all my work I search for harmonious geometrical lines in my subjects’ physical features.’ Joel Simon