About the Artist

I am a visual artist and musician from St Paul Minnesota.  I have a BFA from the College of Visual Arts, I studied at the Atelier Lack and later studied with painter Joe Paquet.

There are many who have been profoundly influential and encouraged me to keep reaching;  Robert Nelson, Tom Casmer, Dale Redpath, Joe Paquet and Joshua Cunningham among others.  To these folks I am eternally grateful.

After briefly illustrating post art school, I started a mural painting business and spent the next twenty years sculpting and painting for themed restaurants, water parks and themed parks across the country and over seas.

I gravitate to small town and urban landscape most often for subject.  I like the human touch upon nature and the story that it tells (almost everything everywhere has one).  I love the beauty in everyday life that can easily be overlooked or dismissed.  Maybe it's an old house, a closed up cafe, an alley full of old boxes, a backyard full of junk, the amusement park we have been to a hundred times, you get the idea. Many of these sorts of places were infinitely important to someone somewhere once upon a time.

A beautiful vista, a seascape or long rolling plains aren't necessarily lost on me.  Quite the opposite actually.  But the way the light catches something for instance in that before mentioned alley full of boxes, something that is usually caught quite by accident, almost as if saying softly “hey I'm still here!”, that's what really gets to me.

The painters that have moved me most are the Ashcan School of artists, in particular Robert Henri, George Bellows, John Sloan and Edward Hopper.

I want the paintings to look like someone painted them vs photographic.  I try to keep everything honest, warts and all.  I try to maintain a balance between objective and subjective truth, and to capture the light that moved me to paint it in the first place.

When I'm not painting, I enjoy spending time with my family and friends, reading, being outdoors, cooking and trying to figure out where in the house to put my next guitar.

Thanks again!

Affiliations

Outdoor Painters of Minnesota

American Impressionists Society

Oil Painters of America

Recent Events

2025 Plein Air Magazine Salon, August Finalist "Seed of Hope"

2025 American Impressionist Society - 5th Annual Member Exhibition - "Cloudy With a Chance of Vino"

2025 Into Nature Plein Air - Judges Award "Meadow Blossoms No.3"

2025 Artists Paint Red Wing MN Plein Air - Best Sense of Place Award - "Cloudy With a Sense of Vino"

2025 Outdoor Painters of Minnesota - Travel Show - Marshall, MN

2025 American Impressionist Society - Small Works Show - Fallbrook, CA

2025 Northern Lights Show - White Bear Lake MN

2025 Outdoor Painters of Minnesota - Members Show - St Paul MN

2024 Oil Painters of America Member Show

2024 Minnesota State Fair - Fine Arts Competition 

2024 Into Nature Plein Air - White Bear Lake MN - Best Of Show

2024 Red Wing Plein Air - Artists Paint Red Wing - Red Wing MN - Award Of Merit

2024 American Impressionists Society - Member Show

2024 Northern Lights Show - White Bear Lake MN

2023 Outdoor Painters of Minnesota - Members Show - St Paul MN

2023 White Bear Center for the Arts - Members Show

2023 Into Nature Plein Air - White Bear Lake MN - Honorable Mention