There’s a lot more than meets the eye with Gavin Jordan, beyond his career as the chief financial officer at Cornerstone United Holdings.

Since 2016, Jordan has been spending his evenings, after coming home from work, restoring and developing his art skills.

Jordan is not the only creative talent in his family. Born and raised in Elletson Flats in St Andrew, Jordan, the third of four boys, grew up in a nuclear family. His father, an artist in his own right, worked in maintenance at Air Jamaica and his mother was a stay-at-home parent at the time. His two older brothers both went to university before him, one pursuing traditional academics at the University of the West Indies and the other pursuing art at Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts.

Jordan attended Jamaica College for high school, which was the last time he did art before he went on to pursue a bachelor’s degree in accounting at the University of the West Indies and his Master’s degree in Financial Management at the University of London.

“I’ve always felt like my purpose was not defined. I’ve always felt somewhat of an emptiness towards what my purpose should be. You know, you’re doing this and doing well, but you keep asking yourself, what else?” said Jordan when asked why he returned to creating art.

“One day, I was given an assignment to work in New Jersey- it was long, long hours, lots of stress and I remember driving with my wife, Tame, past an art store and felt a desire to pick up some art supplies to do some sketches as a form of therapy to deal with the stressful environment,” recalled Jordan.

He cited these initial sketches he made, and the reception he got to them after posting them online in 2016, as what reminded him of the passion he had for art in high school. With this rekindled passion for sketching, he began to try his hand at painting, and quickly grew and incorporated the use of other techniques and equipment such as his signature style of using drywall screws in his work

“Ever since I started going down that road it’s like I’m being pushed even further by a force. I have had this insatiable need to just continue exploration in the creative space,” he said.

Jordan now creates his pieces by strategically placing drywall screws into canvas. He pointed out that all the art frames he works with are custom built by him and the screws in particular are a familiar object to him from the times in his youth when he worked in construction to pay his school fees.

His recent gallery showing, ‘Moments in Time’, focused thematically on key points in youth, symbolic of the past, his own past and family history and elderly people, representing age, experiences and also looking towards the future.

Jordan, a father of two teenage daughters, after spending the majority of his life in corporate and his rediscovered love for art, says that it’s important to him that both his daughters feel open enough and supported enough to pursue anything they put their minds to.