Jules Schaeffer

Jules Schaeffer was born in 1930 and grew up in Philadelphia. In 1950, he enlisted in the Air Force so that he could attend college under the G.I. Bill. During his three-year assignment in Japan, the experience of immersing himself in a new culture profoundly shaped his artistic sensibilities. After returning to the US, he attended the Philadelphia College of Art before moving to New York City with his wife, Barbara, whom he met in school. Jules soon made a name for himself in advertising, spending the 1950s-80s as a creative director — an original Mad Man — collaborating with luminaries like Andy Warhol over the course of his professional career.

Parallel to his achievements in advertising, Schaeffer emerged as a visual artist during the Abstract Expressionist Movement of the 1950s. His artistic focus became creating mono-prints, characterized by his pioneering layering technique. Through subtle adjustments with each press pass, his method yielded prints imbued with remarkable depth, achieved through slight changes of color and opacity with each new layer. His scope of work also includes assemblage, oil and acrylic painting, and photo emulsion.

The Emulsion Prints

After Schaeffer left advertising in the early 90’s, he spent a few years working at the Princeton Packet Newspaper setting up printing still done by printing press. By accident one day some film they used in this process was destroyed and it revealed to Jules’s artist’s eye an other-worldly landscape. This revelation spurred him on to experiment with film and emulsion printing. He then created rich abstract compositions and continued to hone this technique to what you see here. These prints continue Jules’s exploration of letting the medium unfold and mastering it.

Instagram: @Jules_Schaeffer

Website: julesschaeffer.com

Email: info@julesschaeffer.com 

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