The art of Jules Kirschenbaum, with its very apparent reflection of the artist's struggle to find meaning in life, is a search for truth in odd bits of studio debris, in strange or imagined objects, or in his own visage.

Drawing on existential themes from philosophy, literature, and religion, the artist deals with issues of mortality and the spirit. In an age which reveled in abstraction and images of the banal, Kirschenbaum's work was steeped in the Western tradition of representation.

In his mature work, images of people and objects become metaphors for a deep...