Jaq Chartier

Jaq Chartier (born 1961) is an American visual artist. Chartier gained recognition for her Testing series, abstract paintings that are also active visual records of Chartier's tests of her materials - how they migrate and change in reaction to each other, sunlight, and the passage of time.

Chartier's artworks have been exhibited in museums and galleries worldwide.

Education Chartier received her BFA in Painting from the University of Massachusetts in 1984, and her MFA from the University of Washington in 1994. While preparing the sample boards, Chartier arrived at her idea to create artworks from her tests.

To produce her Testing paintings, Chartier applies her own formulas of inks, stains, and dyes often made from non-art materials such as furniture stains or fabric dyes, onto gessoed panels in a predetermined composition. She relies on chance and the unpredictability of her materials “to do things paint can't do – change, shift, and migrate through other layers of paint, or separate into component parts with differing properties.” Scientific images inspire the visual compositions of her paintings in which the colors “bleed and seep in unexpected ways”. Chartier learned about gel electrophoresis from coverage of the O.J. Simpson trial. Chartier has stated, “I'm using the creative processes in both painting and science as metaphors for one another: for curiosity and exploring and documenting the natural world with a sense of wonder.” But as critic Barbara Morris notes, “The lack of a quantifiable goal ultimately subverts the scientific air of the project. What you see is instead a purely visual investigation into the behavior of specific, individually selected materials as they are subjected to a sequence of physical and chemical manipulations.” Morris writes, “With [their] grid structure, Chartier's work relates to a broad spectrum of geometric abstraction and Minimalism, the subtle, poetic squares of Agnes Martin, the stripes of painters like Frank Stella and Kenneth Noland and the resin-based painting of Markus Linnenbrink…” In 2006 Chartier presented her Testing paintings in a solo exhibition at the University of Michigan's Institute for the Humanities. Chartier's work was featured in the exhibition and catalog Diagnose [Art]: Contemporary Art Reflecting Medicine, presented by the Museum im Kulturspeicher, Würzburg, Germany and the Kunst-Museum Ahlen, Germany. The artist's Testing paintings were included in the 2008 exhibition Genesis – Die Kunst der Schöpfung (The Art of Creation), organized by the Zentrum Paul Klee, Bern, Switzerland. In 2015 Chartier's work was included in the exhibition Diphthong at the Fiterman Gallery at Borough of Manhattan Community College, NY. The NYU Langone Art Program exhibited Chartier's work in the 2019 exhibition Metamorphosis: Agents of Change which included works by Laurie Frick and Boeke Lab. Also in 2019, Chartier was commissioned to create a video installation for Merck Research Laboratories, South San Francisco. In 2021 Chartier's work was included in the exhibition Wunderkammer 3 at the Esbjerg KunstMuseum in Denmark. Chartier's work is held in the Esbjerg KunstMuseum's collection.

Chartier's artworks have been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions at the Frye Art Museum, Seattle; , Kunsthaus Centre d’art, Biel Bienne, Switzerland; Urban Institute for Contemporary Arts, Grand Rapids; Platform Gallery, Seattle in 2006, 2009, and 2013; Schroeder Romero Gallery, Brooklyn; Morgan Lehman Gallery, New York; Elizabeth Leach Gallery, Portland in 2005,2010, 2016, 2020 and 2025; Dolby Chadwick Gallery, San Francisco; Robischon Gallery, Denver; J. Rinehart Gallery, Seattle; Limn Gallery, San Francisco; In 1999, 2005, and 2006 Chartier was a Neddy Fellowship Award nominee.

In 2004 Marquand Books published a catalogue of Chartier's Testing artworks with an essay by curator Robin Held. Art Miami purchased the fair in 2012.

Chartier's paintings have been featured in the Showtime television series Billions.

Personal life Jaq Chartier was born November 30, 1961, in Albany, Georgia. The artist lives and works in Seattle, Washington.