This month we are featuring Jeffrey Berg for the Capitol Hill Art League’s Mind of the Artist series. Read his story and check out his artwork below.

You can view more of Jeffrey’s artwork here:

I’ve drawn for as long as I can remember. I’m pretty much obsessed with the line of a pencil: even when I don’t have a pencil in hand, in my mind’s eye I’m drawing what I see before me. Particularly people.

This piece, The Memoirist, is part of a three drawing suite that asks, when looking at your life, what mattered most?:

Over time, what’s been most important for me has been to find my own voice. And then trust and follow it, even in the face of recurring self-doubt.  I think artist voices are like fingerprints, each unique in its own way. That’s why I’m so curious about other’s work: it reveals their experience and worldview.

This drawing, part of a series of three, is called A Memory and captures a moment of recollection, embodied by a found vintage photo:

People are the center of my work; my drawing is figurative and based on narrative. People often ask what the story behind a drawing is but I prefer the viewer to ascribe their own story to what they see. My stories are often based on personal experience, current events, social justice issues, what I’m reading.

This drawing, The Waiting Room, part of a set of four, captures an inward moment.

These days, I’m working with color pencil mostly, on large to medium sized paper. I often draw in series, like chapters of a book. Sometimes I have a specific concept that I want to explore, other times it simply evolves, reveals itself.

Here’s a large drawing, part of a series of three exploring the experience of people unmoored in the climate change diaspora:

Most recently, my work has been inward-looking. Drawing from my experience as a counselor in a community mental health clinic, and compounded by pandemic-imposed isolation, I’ve been exploring such internal issues as memory, dreams, identity, how our personal history is our lens.

This drawing, also part of a series of three, is called Dreamscape and portrays a friend’s recurring dream:

Website … https://jeffreyberg.art

Facebook … Jeff Berg

Instagram … @jeffcberg