
Small Canvases
15 works

Trying Crying, 2024
Oil on canvas
60 x 48 in 152.4 x 121.9 cm
Eric Stefanski's "Trying Crying" presents two words stacked vertically on canvas, their near-rhyme creating a visual and phonetic echo that collapses the distance between effort and release. Rendered in Stefanski's characteristic approach to text-based painting, the words sit against the surface with a directness that belies their emotional complexity. The repetition of sound—the shared "-rying" suffix—transforms what could be a simple statement into something more incantatory, as if the act of trying inevitably curves toward crying, or perhaps the reverse. The work operates within Stefanski's ongoing investigation of language as both image and emotional residue. Words here are not illustrations of feeling but its material form, carrying the weight of meaning through their visual presence rather than decorative embellishment. The scale—sixty by forty-eight inches—grants these two small words monumental presence, forcing viewers to sit with their implications rather than scan past them. There is no narrative context, no explanatory framework, only the stark confession of a relationship between states of being that most viewers will recognize in their own experience. Stefanski's practice strips text to its affective core, treating words as objects that accumulate meaning through repetition, placement, and the subtle decisions of paint application. "Trying Crying" exemplifies this economy, finding vast emotional territory in minimal linguistic material. The painting doesn't tell us what prompted the trying or the crying—it simply presents the loop, the exhausting proximity of perseverance and its breaking point. For acquisition inquiries regarding this work, please contact Guy Hepner gallery in New York.
Price on Application


Eric Stefanski
4 Cards
2024

Eric Stefanski
5 cards
2035

Eric Stefanski
Ace of Hearts
2025

Eric Stefanski
All Day
2024

Eric Stefanski
Always Better
2024

Eric Stefanski
Because
2024

Eric Stefanski
Because it Feels Good
2024

Eric Stefanski
Breaking News
2024

Eric Stefanski
Can't Stop Thinking About You
2026

Eric Stefanski
Cards
2024

Eric Stefanski
Crying and Dancing
2024

Eric Stefanski
Deck of Hearts
2026

Eric Stefanski
Doing Things
2025

Eric Stefanski
Domestic Bliss
2024

Eric Stefanski
Enjoy Your Life
2026

Eric Stefanski
Everything
2025

Eric Stefanski
Everything Will Be Ok Eventually
2026

Eric Stefanski
Fan Of You
2025

Eric Stefanski
Feels Good
2024

Eric Stefanski
Flirting
2024

Eric Stefanski
FU
2026

Eric Stefanski
Fuck
2026

Eric Stefanski
Fuck Em
2025

Eric Stefanski
Fuck it I Love You
2024

Eric Stefanski
Fuck It Love You
2026

Eric Stefanski
Genius and Fraud
2023

Eric Stefanski
Get It Together
2026

Eric Stefanski
God Bless Us Romantics
2026

Eric Stefanski
Hugs and Drugs
2024

Eric Stefanski
I Can Be Your Lover Boy
2023

Eric Stefanski
I Can't Stop Thinking About You
2026

Eric Stefanski
I Hope This Feelings Last
2026

Eric Stefanski
I Miss Fucking You
2026

Eric Stefanski
I Need, Want, Adore
2026

Eric Stefanski
I'm Sorry I Broke Your Heart
2026

Eric Stefanski
I'm Too Romantic
2024

Eric Stefanski
It's Always Get Better
2026

Eric Stefanski
It's Just You And Me Baby
2023

Eric Stefanski
Just Shut Up
2026

Eric Stefanski
Just Shut Up
2024

Eric Stefanski
Kiss Me Baby
2026

Eric Stefanski
Let's Quit Our Fucking Jobs and Go Dancing
2026

Eric Stefanski
Look Me In The Eye
2026

Eric Stefanski
Look Me In The Eye
2026

Eric Stefanski
Lost Without You
2026

Eric Stefanski
Love Me
2024

Eric Stefanski
Lover
2024

Eric Stefanski
Maybe Art is the Solution
2024

Eric Stefanski
Oh My God I Don't Care About Your Feelings
2023

Eric Stefanski
OMG Nobody Cares
2026

Eric Stefanski
One Day
2026

Eric Stefanski
Our Obsession is Relentless
2026

Eric Stefanski
Our Romance is Real
2023

Eric Stefanski
Reasons To Make Art
2024

Eric Stefanski
Remember
2023

Eric Stefanski
Romantic
2023

Eric Stefanski
Sad Ones
2023

Eric Stefanski
Saturday Sunday
2024

Eric Stefanski
She Makes Me Feel Alive
2024

Eric Stefanski
Showbiz
2024

Eric Stefanski
Sky Opens
2023

Eric Stefanski
So Many Wonderful Things Lie Ahead
2026

Eric Stefanski
Stop Flirting
2025

Eric Stefanski
Talk Dirty
2023

Eric Stefanski
Thank God We Found Each Other
2026

Eric Stefanski
This is All We Need
2026

Eric Stefanski
When I Want To
2023

Eric Stefanski
Who Gives A Shit
2026

Eric Stefanski
Worry
2024

Eric Stefanski
Your Lips Belong To Me
2026
Eric Stefanski's paintings occupy a distinctive position within the contemporary American art market — combining the visual vocabulary of Pop Art and street culture with a formally rigorous approach to colour, composition, and text that has attracted serious collector attention. At Guy Hepner, Stefanski works have been placed with collectors drawn to accessible, wit-driven contemporary painting that rewards both immediate engagement and sustained looking.
Stefanski's paintings are priced from approximately $5,000 to $35,000 depending on scale and complexity, with commissioned works and sold-out series commanding premiums on the secondary market. His work has attracted fashion, entertainment, and finance collectors who respond to its cultural fluency and visual confidence.
Stefanski's practice draws on advertising, commercial signage, and the aesthetics of American vernacular culture, recontextualising familiar visual language within the formal conventions of fine art painting. His works typically combine text — often humorous, ironic, or affirmatory statements — with bold graphic compositions executed in acrylic on canvas or panel.
His engagement with popular culture is knowing rather than merely appropriative: Stefanski filters consumer imagery through an art-historical awareness that connects his practice to Pop Art predecessors while maintaining a distinctly contemporary voice.
Stefanski's text-based works generate the strongest collector response, particularly those that strike a balance between wit and formal precision. Works from early sold-out series have demonstrated meaningful secondary market appreciation, reflecting both collector attachment and constrained supply.
Large-scale paintings work particularly effectively in the residential and commercial contexts where Stefanski's collector base predominantly operates.
Stefanski's works are authenticated through his studio. The acrylic medium is stable and relatively robust; works stored and displayed appropriately require minimal conservation attention.
Stefanski's consistent output and expanding collector base position his paintings as strong acquisitions at their current price points. His primary market remains accessible, creating genuine upside opportunity for early collectors as his institutional profile continues to develop.
Contact Guy Hepner at 177 10th Avenue, New York to discuss Eric Stefanski painting availability and placement.

Eric Stefanski is a Chicago based artist known for large scale abstract paintings that incorporate bold, handwritten text. He studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and earned his MFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, in 2015.
Stefanski's work merges expressive mark making with direct, often humorous or self-deprecating phrases, using language as a way into larger themes around vulnerability, failure, and the pressures of maintaining a creative practice. His large-scale canvases favor vibrant color and bold lettering, with text functioning less as slogan and more as fragments of internal dialogue, blending humor with genuine emotional weight. Through this approach, Stefanski examines what it means to sustain a life as a working artist, treating uncertainty and contradiction as part of the process rather than something to resolve.
His work has been shown extensively in Chicago and Boston, along with solo exhibitions in cities including Tokyo and Madrid, and has continued to expand into galleries and institutions internationally.
He continues to live and work in Chicago.
Guy Hepner works with collectors seeking Eric Stefanski's bold, text-driven abstract paintings. Contact us to discuss available inventory or to inquire about upcoming releases.