Chantal Joffe

Chantal Joffe was born in 1969 in St. Albans, Vermont (USA), and currently lives and works in London. She studied at the Glasgow School of Art and earned her Master’s Degree from the Royal College of Art in London in 1994. Her work, like that of Martin Maloney, is categorized as "Bad Painting," referring to a transgressive pictorial trend that is deliberately ungraceful and distorted. This form of realism carries neither protest nor rebellion but instead seeks an intimate status where the represented subjects are placed at the center, filled with fear and a desire to peer into their own souls.

Joffe creates portraits, painted with fluid and swift brushstrokes, capturing the emotions, vulnerabilities, and vitality of human existence. Her subjects are often female figures—girls, adolescents, and women—depicted at various stages of life. Her themes balance innocence with sensuality, naivety with irony. Through mature, confident brushstrokes and a palette alternating between soft hues and bold tones, Joffe portrays human emotions, creating a sense of detachment between the subject and the viewer, who might feel a certain discomfort, guilty of having looked too closely at something private.