John Leary is a Chicago-based artist who currently works primarily in acrylic in on paper.

“Back in the 1960s,” says Leary, “a researcher named R.A. Butler discovered that monkeys and chimps would perform various work-tasks to get food or to enjoy the visual stimulation of simply looking out a window. When they had eaten enough food, the monkeys stopped doing the work-tasks. But they never tired of looking and would do the work-tasks repeatedly to re-open the window. I don’t think we humans are much different, and I want my painting to feed that primitive desire to see, which we share with our primate cousins.

“Acrylic ink is a fascinating material. It is more intense than watercolors and has a life of its own. It is a spontaneously active material on wet paper. It moves. It dissolves. It coalesces. It forms subtle gradients and crisp edges. It is only partly under my control, so that each piece is a product of both what I want and what it wants. It is great fun, always surprises, and appeals to the monkey in me.”

Leary studied figure and portrait drawing and painting with Bob Horn at Lill Street Art Center in Chicago and with Jason Miklik at the North Shore Art League in Winnekta, where he also studied etching with Jessica Feith. Although for several years he focused on painting portraits in oil, he has more recently begun to explore abstract themes using acrylic media. In 2014, he joined a cooperative gallery called Images on the north side of Chicago.

John grew up in Baltimore and received his BA, MA, and PhD in History from the University of Chicago. From 1975 to 2006, he taught history at the Francis W. Parker School in Chicago. Leary has traveled extensively: Kuwait, Oman, Syria, Tunisia, China, India, South Africa, Tanzania, Egypt, Italy, France, Mexico, and Scotland. John and his wife, Jan English Leary, a fiction writer, live in Chicago, where he works in his home studio.