Darrel Ellis (1958–1992), a mixed-media artist known for his experimental approach to painting and photography, explored the psychic terrain between surface, memory, and lyric self-representation. A devoted admirer of the European tradition of painting, Ellis’s expressive depiction of family members both living and deceased are odes to time immemorial and the notion of how we come to know ourselves through image and relation, desire and distortion. Working in part from his late father’s photographs, Ellis developed a unique process whereby he projected, deconstructed, and re-imaged his family history, creating uncanny portraits marked by voids and warps. His commitment to the self-portrait was no less inspired, particularly after his experiences of being photographed by Robert Mapplethorpe and Peter Hujar. Ellis was on the cusp of major recognition when his life was cut short by AIDS in 1992, at the age of 33. [VisualAIDS]