A painting of a woman with red hair playing a lute, draped in a yellow and green patterned cloth, with a blue curtain background. On a table in front of her are lemons in a silver bowl, a scroll tied with a red ribbon, and a rolled-up letter.

Inspired by the human figure, Jenny Chi paints in a style reminiscent of the old masters, conducting a personal, sometimes rather sly dialogue with the Italian Renaissance.

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Her amicable appropriation of the Old West makes one aware of art not just as finished work but as a way of seeing — an inexhaustible language that can be learned and shared, and that always retains the power of saying new things.

“I mean by a picture a beautiful romantic dream of something that never was, never will be - in a light better than any light that ever shone - in a land no one can define, or remember, only desire.” ― Edward Burne-Jones

Education

BA, Lewis University
Romeoville, IL

MFA, School of Figurative Art
New York Academy of Art

Awards & Honors

White House Blue Ribbon Christmas Project

Duval County Artist in Residence

Cultural Council Fellowship, Jacksonville, FL

Carl Steinsieck Memorial Award, St. Augustine Art Association

George Sugarman Foundation Grant

Current Position

Professor, Art Department
Eastern Illinois University
Painting & Life Drawing

Her work has been exhibited throughout the United States and held in numerous private collections worldwide.