Born in Plantation, Florida, and based in Fort Lauderdale, Jed-Lee Metayer is a Haitian self-taught abstract painter whose work explores healing, memory, and transformation.
After losing his father during the COVID-19 pandemic, Metayer turned to painting as a form of therapy. What began as a personal outlet became an ongoing exploration of breaking cycles of trauma and rebuilding identity. In a society that often leaves little room for men to express vulnerability, his work creates space for reflection, emotional honesty, and healing. Working primarily through abstraction, Metayer uses bold fields of color, negative space, and recurring spirals to examine the non-linear nature of growth and rebirth. Rather than offering fixed narratives, his paintings invite viewers to discover their own emotions and experiences within the work.
Along his artistic journey, Metayer discovered he is red-green colorblind. While he often relies on the labels of his paint tubes to distinguish certain colors, this challenge has only deepened his intentional approach to color and expanded the boundaries of his practice.
GENESIS
GENESIS is an art work deeply inspired by my emotions after I made the decision to get baptized. A decision that represented me washing away the sins of my past and declaring to make a public commitment to God. And once I came out of the water I felt clean. refreshed. new. However, I no longer knew how to react to my past.
All of my regrets, trials, heart breaks, shame, losses. All the unpleasant memories I’d feel much better not having. Then, after much prayer and meditation while working on this painting, I realized that these experiences, though painful, are priceless. They all shaped me and led me into this decision. They do not define me, They are what gives my story depth. For Jesus died for me when I was still a sinner, and through baptism the old me has died and a new me has been resurrected with him.
As you come out of the water, you look back into it you see the natural oils of your body swirl and dance upon the surface. You had a whole world of experiences within you. I honor their memory. This is their joyous eulogy. And now, a new world being formed. We are allowing our past to be our Prologue, to the story in which we live purposefully and intentionally. This is a new beginning. This is Genesis.
Sanctuary
As I went further into my artistic practice, Prayer became a core element to my creative process. I originally began to create as a means to have safe space to put my emotions. They felt too raw, volatile, and confusing for me to share with others. At the same time, if I repressed them they would form root in my subconsciousness. Denying myself the ability to be able to navigate my emotions in a healthy way.
They needed to be expressed, they still needed somewhere to go. Therefore I created the safe spaces I needed. But eventually I realized the comfort and revelation I could provide myself was finite. So when I painted, the dialogue ceased to simply be between me and myself, But included God in the conversation as well. I realized that God also wanted me to share those emotions with him, too intimate for others. And that its when I realized what it means to truly pray. Full honesty with The Creator and true honesty with self.
Creation and Prayer are sanctuaries. It is not enough for me to know this, but for those around me to understand this as well I wanted to make an entryway to that sanctuary for others. So that they too could experience that comes from finding a truly safe space to express yourself—somewhere or someone you can pour everything to. For me, that is prayer. And I feel like that can work with you, too.
