TEACHING AND MAKING ARE ONE CONTINUOUS LOOP FOR ME. THE CLASSROOM FEEDS THE STUDIO, AND THE STUDIO FUELS THE CLASSROOM.

BIO

Jesse Payne is an Associate Professor of Art at VCUarts Qatar, where he has led the Drawing Curriculum in the Art Foundations Department since 2010. With a BFA in Painting/Drawing from Indiana State University and an MFA in Painting from Northern Illinois University, Payne brings over 20 years of experience as both a practicing artist and educator.

His teaching and creative practice operate in a circular dialogue—classroom innovations feed directly into his studio work, while his personal research cycles back to shape new pedagogies. For Payne, the act of teaching is never separate from artmaking; it is a form of research in itself. Each assignment, each critique, each experiment with students becomes a catalyst for rethinking their own methods, resulting in a hybrid practice where education and creation constantly inform one another.

This approach has fueled projects ranging from traditional drawing foundations to cutting-edge courses exploring AI as a creative partner, such as the IDEA Fund–supported Artistic Intelligence: The Intersection of AI and Creativity. Here, students experiment with platforms like MidJourney and ChatGPT, learning to see technology not as a replacement for human imagination but as a collaborator in expanding its reach.

Payne’s teaching excellence has been recognized with multiple awards, including the Distinguished Achievement in Teaching Excellence Award from VCUarts Qatar (2025 & 2012) and the Excellence in Teaching Award from Savannah College of Art & Design (2009).

As an artist, his current work explores portals, disrupted forms, and thresholds between the material and the digital, often merging AI-generated imagery with analog mark-making. Whether in the classroom or the studio, Payne remains committed to one question: How can art—human, technological, or both—create spaces for mystery, transformation, and discovery?