Artist
& Author
Lucas Stoffel is a painter working from a loft on Coenties Slip in Lower Manhattan — the same row of buildings where Robert Indiana, Ellsworth Kelly, Agnes Martin, and James Rosenquist lived and worked in the late 1950s, shaping what became American Pop Art and color field painting. Stoffel inherits that lineage and pushes it outward: flattening sacred iconography from across the world into bold, graphic compositions. Over fifteen years of travel through more than 40 countries, he has photographed temples, ceremonies, and rituals across Asia, then translated those images into large-scale acrylic paintings that sit between reverence and disruption.
Raised Catholic in rural Iowa and trained in graphic design, Stoffel approaches the world's spiritual traditions as both outsider and devotee. His work has been recognized by GLAAD, exhibited at the Puck Building for the amfAR benefit, and earned him the Starving Artist Award. He has been commissioned by Ralph Lauren's family and the Hong Kong Ballet, with exhibitions at The Art Directors Club, Prince George Gallery, GalleryBar, and New World Stages. His Pop Art Tarot is published by Rockpool Publishing and distributed worldwide by Simon & Schuster.
The ways humans build beauty around things they can't see or prove. Every culture has its own visual language for faith — temple carvings, ceremonial dress, sacred geometry — and I'm obsessed with all of it. I've spent fifteen years photographing these traditions across more than 40 countries, trying to understand why devotion always produces such extraordinary imagery.
What inspires you?
How would you describe your work?
Large-scale acrylic paintings that flatten sacred imagery into pop art. Bold color, hard outlines, graphic symmetry. I was trained as a graphic designer before I was a painter, and that shows — the compositions are tight and controlled, but the subject matter is spiritual and chaotic.
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What is your creative process like?
Everything begins with my photography. I shoot on location — temples, shrines, ceremonies — then digitally compose and reinterpret the images before painting them on canvas. The process is a deliberate translation: documentary photography becomes graphic design becomes fine art.
See Features in The New York Times and The Huffington Post.
What is an artist’s role in society and how do you see that evolving?
To make people look at something familiar and see it differently. If someone walks past my work and for even a moment considers that the beauty in a Buddhist temple and the beauty in a Catholic cathedral come from the same human impulse — that's enough.
I was the recipient of the Starving Artist Award, and the featured artist for the amFar Rocks Benefit for AIDS research which was displayed at the Puck Building. My work was highlighted at AM New York’s Premiere Art Rocks event, and I was featured on the cover of Next Magazine, which brought me many new followers, including Dylan’s Candy Bar, who commissioned me to work on a confection-inspired collection. My work has been shown at the Art Directors Club, The Prince George Gallery, GalleryBar, and New World Stages, among other venues in New York City.