Artist's Profile

HOW I PAINT

I have been painting in oils and watercolors all my life. My mother was a painter; I had excellent art teachers in school; and after college I studied some evenings with an abstract impressionist who was deeply thoughtful about the essence and aesthetics of pure painting. However, I have never really undergone training; I have essentially taught myself by emulating various artists who have particularly appealed to me. In my youth, I was captivated by the great illustrations of N.C. Wyeth, Arthur Rackham, Howard Pyle, and other great illustrators of children’s books. It should be evident that I have also admired Rembrandt, J.M.W.Turner, Winslow Homer, Andrew Wyeth, Van Gogh, and Claude Monet, among many others.

It will probably be apparent in this show that my approaches are varied and do not conform to a single “style”. I really am not seeking to paint in a singular way. There are products that are fully “me”, but I do not apologize for trying what some would call derivative styles because I feel great satisfaction in the process of deeply analyzing and, indeed, imitating the way my heroes have painted. By studying how they saw things and went about their work, I can try to learn a broader sense of color, greater versatility of technique, and a deeper understanding of the difference between great art and most painting.

Though it is landscape painting which I pursue, pictorial subject matter is subordinate to the excitement I derive from playing with color, passages of color, and the physical, tactile qualities of the paint. Sometimes I seek powerful forms and colors; sometimes I try for subtleties in both. I suppose I am always trying for overall atmosphere, tone, and coherence, and that is dictated as much by the development of the painting itself as by my preconceptions. Often a painting will end up very far from its beginnings. A painting should be telling me what to do, not the reverse. Interestingly, as I have become better at painting, I have become more dissatisfied with results because I have developed a more critical eye. I attribute this to the continuous and careful study of paintings by great painters, particularly in the close, detailed inspection of the little corners and passages which comprise the whole.