Stanley Casselman’s “Serendipitous Self Portraits” at AP Space
Serendipitous Self Portraits by Stanley Casselman, a dynamic exhibition of color, movement, and metaphysical inquiry. On view Sept 5–Oct 5 at AP Space, New York.
What does it mean to see yourself through paint—not as a reflection, but as an evolving question? In Serendipitous Self Portraits, on view at AP Space from September 5 to October 5, 2024, Stanley Casselman presents eight years of artistic inquiry, material mastery, and metaphysical exploration.
Casselman, known for his technical brilliance and experimental spirit, doesn’t offer traditional self-portraits. Instead, his work reveals emotional signatures, intuitive choices, and layered metaphors—an introspective cosmos of vibrant movement and quiet rupture. In every composition, there’s a sense of spontaneity colliding with precision. Serenity balanced against entropy.
This exhibition marks not only a new chapter in the artist’s career but also his formal representation with AP Space, deepening his presence within the New York art scene and beyond.
Stanley Casselman (b. 1963) approaches painting like a physicist armed with poetry. Influenced by fields ranging from astronomy and acoustics to literature and visual perception, his practice expands traditional painting techniques to explore deeper truths about human experience and reality. His canvases are not depictions, but phenomena—alive with energy, tension, and shifting relationships.
In works where fading silhouettes dissolve into luminous bursts, or sharp edges vibrate alongside soft gradients, Casselman constructs emotional terrains that feel both otherworldly and intimate. Each piece invites viewers to interpret freely, but always leaves the sense that something profound is being examined just beneath the surface.
His materials include not just paint and canvas, but also delicate silkscreen mesh—a technical challenge he meets with relentless curiosity. This surface, barely there yet structurally crucial, becomes the space where gesture and gravity dance.
Casselman’s broader recognition came unexpectedly in 2012, when art critic Jerry Saltz of New York Magazine challenged any painter to "fake a Richter." Casselman accepted—not to copy, but to reinterpret the lineage of squeegee-based abstraction. His resulting works surprised even Saltz, who praised their originality and force, ultimately profiling Casselman in a feature that year.
Yet Casselman’s practice predates and transcends that moment. After receiving his BA from Pitzer College in Claremont, California, he debuted in New York in 1986 with Maurice-Heyman Fine Art. Since then, his work has appeared in respected collections and institutions, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Guggenheim, Georgia Museum of Art, Flint Institute of Arts, Borusan Contemporary, and the New Orleans Museum of Art.
Always reaching for new creative frontiers, Casselman has recently teamed up with renowned fashion designer Naeem Khan—long celebrated as a protégé of Halston. Together, under the moniker KACE, the duo merges high fashion with immersive art. Their collaboration is less about crossover and more about synthesis—a way to experience fabric, paint, and light as one seamless, boundary-breaking language.
To accompany the Serendipitous Self Portraits exhibition, AP Space is debuting a short documentary: Process to Possibility: the Art of Stanley Casselman. The film offers behind-the-scenes access to Casselman’s practice, from the technical choreography of his studio work to the philosophical impulses behind each stroke. It features insight from art historian Dr. David Anfam and artist Ray Smith, adding thoughtful context to Casselman’s evolution.
What emerges from this documentary and the exhibition itself is not a fixed image of the artist, but an invitation to think about painting as a kind of metaphysical navigation. Casselman’s work doesn’t offer easy interpretations. It asks questions: What is presence? What is absence? Where does form end and energy begin?
Casselman stands at a unique intersection of abstraction, pop sensibility, and conceptual inquiry. His paintings explore the moment before form becomes thought and the residue left when emotion passes through gesture.
Serendipitous Self Portraits isn’t just a retrospective of eight years. It’s an unfolding, a study of change, risk, and the strange alchemy of paint, intention, and chance.
