Jim Gardner

My earliest memory is drawing a spider for my old grandma Maud. And to this day, my art is kind of dark in subject matter. I've been doing art since 2000, from about the time I was first diagnosed with schizophrenia. I spent five years in a mental hospital. No fun. I was lucky to be able to crayon in a kid's coloring book. Although I've been in complete remission for over twenty years, still, my experience with mental illness influences my art, both directly and indirectly. For instance, with my psychosis I believed I was the second coming of Christ, that is, God. And sure enough, many of my paintings have Jesus as a subject or religion. Of course, much art through the ages is religious, from Neolithic cave paintings, to the cathedral and church art of the Middle Ages, and all the way to Van Gogh and Picasso. It was very deep when I was Jesus; delusions are powerful. I have no formal education in art; I am self taught and am glad about that because It allows my own style to take center stage, without rules of painting stifling me. Because I have no formal training in art and had a psychosis, my paintings fall under the category of "outsider art". It's the style of art done by kids, the insane and those without a formal education in...

I graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a bachelor's in Psychology from the City university of New York.

I have two solo exhibitions lined up for early 2026. One is at Doubting Thomas gallery, and the other at Negative Space gallery, both in Cleveland.