“I am an innovator in engineering a variety of media and techniques to create a new and very different look and style. To communicate visually a reality I could not say with words but through color, shapes and forms. I paint my changing world in search of different human experiences. This is the passion which drives me to create a bridge of understand between me as the artist and the viewer."
WHY I CALL MYSELF A VISUAL COMMUNICATION ENGINEER
(Artist Statement)
I am serious about my art and its effect on communicating to you that passion I have for it and life. As a Visual Communication Engineer (artist), I use creativity, innovation, and logic based on good design principles to communicate my viewpoint. As a contemporary mixed-media artist, my abstracts are inspired by my view of the world. When I take off my glasses, the sharp, clear world becomes an abstract play of shapes, colors, and textures, a totally different environment. Color is the most important ingredient in my works. My work explodes with vibrant colors carefully cultivated to create an exciting sense of visual harmony and unity within a composition.
My work allows the viewer to interpret the images in association with their own personal experience, emotion, and subjective perspective to understand the depth of meaning that brings us closer together in the human experience, both personal and within society. For a brief moment, the subject and the colors that express it leap from the canvas into the soul of the viewer.
I use a mixed media approach, but they all start out with acrylics. I will use text, image, or just plain color and design to get my message across. I change my subject matter and technique as it allows me personal growth, to react to the world and events that surround us. If Michelangelo, Picasso, and other great artists only worked in a single medium, we as a society would not have the opportunity to see the depth of their creativity. Besides, I like to shake it up!
THE MIND BEHIND
THE PAINT
​
Growing up in the mixed cultural diversity of the Phoenix metropolitan area in Arizona, I was influenced by a wide variety of both the booming urban growth of a now big city and the southwest desert cultures that exist there. All of this history has influenced my work in contemporary and abstract art forms. Being called the eternal optimist by my painter father, I took up creating in a wide variety of art mediums since I was old enough to hold a crayon, much to the dismay of my parents and their walls. It was at that time that I knew that God had put me on this earth to be an artist. I sold my first piece of art at the age of 15 in a local fine art show and obtained my first commission at 16.
I continued to sell my artwork through my college years, which helped pay for my BA degree in Art Education from Arizona State University in 1979. Once I obtained my degree, I persisted in promoting my artistic vision in a number of art venues: galleries, private collections, art fairs, corporate art purchases, awards, and interior designers.
In 1996, I became a professor at the prestigious Art Institute of Phoenix, then in 2000 continued to teach at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh Online program. I am currently semi-retired and working at Seton Catholic Prep, teaching art and ceramics
I still continue to exhibit my vibrant, refreshing styles of mixed media in a variety of subject matter to communicate the human experience and our relationship with God.
​
Rio Verde Studio 541 2021