Looking for Something : Selected Paintings

Looking for Something is a retrospective look at the work of the artist Brian Kershisnik through his first three prolific decades. Kershisnik is a puzzling and puzzled explorer, both a part of, and separate from his contemporaries. An enthusiastic and optimistic examiner of triumphs and tragedies, Kershisnik exposes the common in the hero and the heroic in the quotidian. He aspires more to the fantastic and rich human warmth of Giotto rather than the cold and distant impressive brilliance of the otherworldly high Renaissance. His life has been lovely, tragic, and bewildering, and his work explores that bewilderment with a mixture of melancholy and whimsy that feels extremely and encouragingly human—this is art that is meant to be lived with. This book, the first publication of Kershisnik’s work in over fifteen years, contains more than two hundred color images of some of his most popular paintings, as well as several essays that put his work into the larger context of his age.