mikayla
Featuring a reoccurring subject in the artist’s wider body of work, mikayla forms part of a larger series of preparatory studies that accompany Jackson’s finished paintings on canvas. In these, the artist uses the expressive medium of charcoal and graphite to depict his subjects in a spontaneous fashion, foregoing intricate detail in favour of capturing the atmosphere of a scene and the essential qualities of the figures that inhabit it. Here, he captures the intimacy between an artist and his muse, as both figures depicted appear lost in a timeless state of mutual self-reflection.
About the Artist
John Reno Jackson
b. 1995
John Reno Jackson is a Caymanian-American painter. He studied at the Slade School of Fine Art (UCL) and received his MA in painting from the Royal College of Art, London (2025), where he was the recipient of the Sir Frank Bowling Scholarship. His work explores the possibilities of painterly expression through varying abstract investigations of his chosen medium. He has exhibited at Tern Gallery in the Bahamas and held a solo exhibition, A Heron Amidst the Storm, at the National Gallery of the Cayman Islands in 2022. His work is in the permanent collection of NGCI, where it has also featured in various exhibitions such as Island of Women: Life at Home During Our Maritime Years (2020), Reimagined Futures – 2nd Cayman Islands Biennial (2021) and The People’s Collection – A 25-Year Cultural Legacy (2022).
