Hey there,
My interest in the human figure began early. I was young and eager, and made it my goal to understand the human form. My first notebooks were filled with drawings of skulls and faces. When I visited my father’s factory, I would gather discarded machine parts and glue them together to create mechanical human hands. Later, in the tradition of Michelangelo, I learned musculature through traditional charcoal exercises, sculpture and cadaver dissections.
I was obsessed! Every surface called out to me. I went from illustrating my school desk with ball point pen, to tattooing my closet walls with markers. I carved my name into my parent’s car door, and eventually spray painted the 40 foot long walls with full color murals. My parents celebrated my interest, and allowed me to draw on the walls of the bedrooms. I covered them from floor to ceiling with exercises assigned by my instructors. As my images grew with emotional intensity and size so did my fervor to take on new media and contents.
I was hungry to learn and followed my interest, first leaving Florida to become a freshman at The Ringling College of Art and Design; where I sought to master painting. My goal was a 4.0, I received a 3.9, but soon realized that despite my grades my art was not getting any better. I then negotiated a judicial drop in grades to maximize my drawing improvements. I sat in on every upper class workshop the instructors would allow. I took extra classes and minimized my down time, by bringing my food back to my dorm to eat and read books on drawing before night classes. I sought out mentors who encouraged me to transfer to more competitive schools with stronger studio presence.
I then travelled to Florence, Italy to study at private ateliers. That summer I doubled up on classes at the Florence academy of art. Learning the site size method I built an even larger map to my already fast growing view of the art world. Walking the streets while reading “The Agony and the Ecstasy” seemed to bring to life the stale visions called up in my art history classes.
After my year in Florence, I was accepted to study at the prestigious Art Center, in Pasadena, CA. Considered the best art school of the world, Art Center attracts an international student body and respected faculty. It’s graduates dominate every field of design. I maxed out my class schedule with studio classes in the basement of the bridge like school. I sought out mentors who introduced me to design legends and incredible oil painting skills. By the end of the semester I had stacks of carefully crafted head paintings and a library of sketchbooks. After carefully studying the best illustration instructors in the school I found myself lacking a bigger target to chase. I took extra classes at another auxiliary school where I meet instructors from New York that planted a seed for the future.
When Art Center could no longer fulfill me I returned to New York to close the loop on my studies there. I apprenticed under my first mentor in Anatomy, like a puppy I followed him to every class he taught, hitting every major New York Art institution. My personal time was limited. I combined cadaver dissection on the weekends with self-driven sculptural exercises that required me to build the human form in clay from skeleton to muscle to skin, I developed an in depth understanding of the human body that rivaled practiced surgeons including my oldest brother, Michael. I snuck into the graduate school to take painting classes with contemporary painting masters. One cloudy afternoon an instructor invited me to lecture to the students about memory drawing, these graduate students eyed me skeptically, as I was not yet 20. Who knew that this would foreshadow the coming years of my life? I built my portfolio and was accepted into the most prestigious and selective private studios Manhattan had to offer. I quickly rose up to senior levels of skill and prowess over the next year and a half. Other students looked to me for guidance in their work and artistic development. My instructors felt threatened by this, and ultimately I was asked to leave as they did not want to be upstaged by a student. I packed up immediately, knowing that such self-centered teaching would ultimately limit me. After dropping out, I acquired representation at a gallery in New York City. This would provide me with my first income from my craft. A pivotal moment for me.
I next travelled to Santa Fe, completing a year of study under Anthony J Ryder, a monk-like figure who spoke softly. He guided me towards my peak performance and fluidity. He gave me the versatility to teach myself and improve as my own guidance could navigate. He invited me to assist in teaching his workshops, teaching 28 or more students to paint and draw as I was taught. Soon after, I began teaching my own workshops at a local art supply store.
Upon losing everything while living in Santa Fe, I went out to get a normal job, as a waiter in a local restaurant. A future as a world class waiter was not in the cards. I ran into a man who hired me on spot to work with him at his stone yard as a carver. This was prophetic at best. I was now carving eight foot tall pieces of marble into arabesque shapes in the workshop of a famous sculptor. He also allowed me to earn extra cash using a pickup truck that was about my age to sell stone to the local colleges for student workshops. I hurled the massive rocks onto a bathroom scale in the bed of the truck to make 15cents a pound. I would spit into the dust of each stone to see the luster and inner color of each piece. I propped stones under the front wheels every time I parked because the truck would not start unless I rolled it down a hill to pop the clutch. As the seasons turned, I soon saved up enough to move on, and as a going away my foreman asked that I do a portrait of his child, and he paid me enough to facilitate a move to Los Angeles.
Los Angeles found me living on my brothers couch, and painting in his two car garage until he and his roommates returned from work, requiring the garage for it’s intended purpose. The apartment overlooked the Pacific. And, inspired by the scale of the ocean, I painted my largest canvases, 5 feet tall and 6 feel wide. These pieces brought me my first taste of real money—earning me my largest payments yet. And I became known within the local art market. Despite having never finished any of my schooling, my portfolio earned me an invitation to teach at accredited colleges.
And so I continue, always a student, always a teacher, always an artist.
