About Charlee
Charlee Ocho is an American contemporary artist whose work excavates the emotional terrain of grief, memory, and transformation. Working primarily with dyed joint compound, acrylic, gesso, and sumi ink, Ocho creates large-scale monochrome surfaces that feel less like paintings and more like artifacts—unearthed remnants of human experience.
His practice is rooted in a deep engagement with material. Joint compound becomes sediment; ink becomes shadow; negative space becomes silence. Through carving, layering, and eroding the surface, Ocho builds visual environments that oscillate between raw physicality and quiet introspection. Each piece reads like a psychological landscape—abstract yet undeniably human.
Ocho’s recent body of work, The Silent Earth, marks a pivotal evolution in his practice: monumental black, gray, and white compositions that confront loss without ornament, embracing austerity as a form of truth-telling. These works emerged from personal grief, including the passing of his beloved companion, Lil’ Man, and stand as meditations on absence, fragility, and what remains.
Influenced by the sensibilities of post-minimalism, abstract expressionism, and contemporary material art, Ocho’s work occupies its own space—poetic, severe, elegiac, and unmistakably his. His commitment to scale and texture invites viewers into intimate proximity, asking them to linger inside the emotional resonance of each piece.
Ocho lives and works in the United States, continually expanding his practice through series-based exploration, color restraint, and an unwavering devotion to authenticity in form and feeling.