Ian Jehle presents "Here's to You," an exhibition of contemporary portrait drawings which trace the influences that led the artist to Japan. The exhibition begins with two large drawings of Donald Richie, the expatriate writer and film critic who has lived in Tokyo since 1953 and Susan Sontag, the counter-cultural essayist and novelist, which represent the public face of contemporary, cross-cultural art criticism. Upstairs, on the second floor the exhibit moves to smaller, more personal drawings of pivotal figures such as actress Setsuko Hara, singer Mika Kimula, as well as the artist's teachers and friends who led him to the work of Richie and Sontag, as well as to Japan. Mr. Jehle has also created a hand drawn guide book that gives short biographies of those portrayed and how each has taken an important role that led the artist to this exhibit in Tokyo.

Ian Jehle, who is based in Washington, DC, received his BFA from American University and his MFA from Columbia University. In addition to his upcoming solo exhibition at gallery-ef in Tokyo, Jehle is also included in exhibitions opening this fall in Dusseldorf Germany, and at the Katzen Museum in Washington. Jehle's recent exhibitions include Me, You and Those Other Folks at Flashpoint Gallery, Washington, DC; Works on Paper, curated by Carter Foster of the Whitney Museum of American Art, at Long Beach Foundation of the Arts, NJ; the Artscape/Baltimore Museum of Art Juried Exhibition, 2005, curated by the BMA's Gary Simmons and Darsie Alexander; and Traveling with Gulliver, a group exploration of Gulliver's Travels, at the District of Columbia Arts Center. Jehle also convened and moderated the lecture series Who Do You Love at DCAC.