Studio Visit with Terry Lee, Wildlife Artist and Sculptor

Capturing his animals in a moment of time and in all of their majestic beauty, his impressionistic style, along with his magnificent sense of color, gives new meaning to Africa’s spectacular 

scenery and wildlife.

Terry believes that traveling to Africa and seeing these animals in their native habitat helps him to see with “African Eyes”. Terry feels that “I do my best to create a sense of energy and action. 

I capture emotional moments using color and light, sweeping brush strokes and bold swaths of color, drawing the eye into the scene. I want the viewer to feel the intense light and heat of the sun, creating atmosphere and mood”.

For twenty years Terry was the owner of a large sporting goods business in Coeur d’ Alene Idaho. Along with the gun and fishing departments, he also included a ski and scuba section. He was a certified scuba instructor for 18 years (N.A.U.I. & P.A.D.I.). 

Deciding that he needed a change, Terry headed for sunny California. It was there that he went through 

that “what do I want to be when I grow up” thing.

Realizing that his life long interest was actually a passion, he turned to pursue a full time art career. He

 returned to Idaho and set up his studio in the same building, where the sporting goods store had been. 

Recognizing the value to himself and other artists in the community, he opened his large studio four nights a week to Life Drawing and Sculpting sessions, providing the model and space to those who are interested in working with the human figure.

 Terry has created a truly unique style. It reflects a combination of the old masters and a lot of “Terry Lee” bringing a new energy to wildlife art. Terry’s collectors experience a bold usage of color that is refreshingly different from anything they have ever seen. As one admirer quoted 

at a recent gallery showing, “You are a breath of fresh air in a world of sameness”. 

Terry enjoys working on large canvas and many of his pieces are five to eight feet long, with some as large as ten feet. These unusually large canvases are perfect for the many corporate collectors he has.  

Terry Lee’s work can be found in Galleries in Montana,Colorado,California,Washington and Idaho.

Terry Lee - 1-208-659-4182

http://www.TerryLeeArt.com

TerryLee@TerryLeeArt.com

All Rights Reserved.

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VL/Artspan Interview with Benjamin Cheshire

Artspan Artist Q&A

http://www.bencheshireart.com/

When did you realize you loved art and wanted to be an artist?   I was very young and started drawing on walls, grocery bags and anything that would take a mark so long ago that I think there were only 49 States in the Union at that time. I believe I may be dating myself, but when I think back to a point in time that could answer the question I only remember enjoying drawing and painting things that were not there.

Who has been your mentor, or greatest influence to date?   I was mostly self taught. It was the comic book artists that first attracted my attention, I wanted to draw just like them. Then in High School I was introduced to the Classical, then the Gothic and Renaissance artists. But if I was to name an artist of influence, I would have to say Leonardo da Vinci. I know that he is not alive in the world, but his joy of understanding and creating art is very much alive in my studio.

Who is another living artist you admire and why?   There are several living artists that I admire, some of them live nearby. But I would have to list Daniel E. Greene and his very talented wife, Wende Caporale as the persons that steered me to the art of pastels. The reason is easily seen in their works.

What is your favorite surface to create work on or to work with? Describe it if you make it yourself.   I love paper, all kinds of paper. I have boxes and shelves of paper. Graphite, pen, pastel and watercolor. I just love the feel of paper.

What are your favorite materials to use?   Graphite and pastels are my materials of choice. Although I am now learning oil and acrylic painting.

Do you have a favorite color palette?   I use so many pastels, that I do not really have a palette. With my incursions into oil painting I have been using Daniel Greene's palette. I like his set up and mixing.

     How often do you work on your artwork? How many hours

     a week?    Pastels and graphite fit into my busy life very well, I can stop at a moment's notice and pick up again quickly. I try to work 4-6 hours every day. Even when I suffer "blank page" I will sit in my studio with a cup of coffee and look at books and magazines. I have a lot.

What is the one thing you would like to be remembered for? Simply, for being a good person.

There are many culprits that can crush creativity, such as distractions, self-doubt and fear of failure. What tends to stand in the way of your creativity?   All of the above, I am never happy with any of my work. This sometimes gets in the way of creating new pieces. But, I get over it and paint.

How do you overcome these obstacles?   I close the door to my studio, and then everyone leaves me alone. There are no phones in my workplace.

What are your inspirations for your work?  I find inspiration in everything around me, foxes running through the forest, early morning light through the trees. Just life in general.

What is your favorite way to get your creative juices flowing?  It's figuring out how to flush my brain of all the aforementioned distractions. Sometimes I will hop the Metro into D.C. and walk through the Art Museums.

Which work of yours is your favorite?  So far I like the pastel "Red Wolf".

Getting to know you Q&A

     What is your favorite color in your closet?  Greens, blues and the required artist black.

What book are you reading this week?  Dan Brown's "Inferno" and  "Operation Barbarossa" by David Glantz.

Do you have a favorite television show? I rarely watch any television.

What is your favorite food?   Just about anything Italian, I love the colors, smells and the appearance of those wonderful Italian dishes.

What color sheets are on your bed right now?   That is an interesting question, they are pale blue.

What are you most proud of in your life?  My three adult children. They are everything to me.

Who would you love to interview?

Do you have a passion or hobby other than painting? What is it? I love to work on and drive my 1971 Triumph. But I am very careful with my hands.

Who would you love to portray in Mixed Media?

If you were an animal what would you be and why?   That is easy, a cat, they are totally cool.

If you were stranded on a desert island and could only take three things, what would they be?  My pencils, paper and of course my wine.

Share something with us that few people know about you.

If you could live anywhere in the world, where would you live?  Bermuda, the reason being, just enough English, with a hint of American and beaches.

Day Trip to the Zoo with Artspan Photographer Pauline Fowler

The Past - 

Born in Liverpool UK, I grew up in Africa reading The Jungle Book, Doctor Dolittle and EVERYTHING Gerald Durrell ever wrote encouraged by my wonderful father. When we got back to the UK again I think I wrote every week to London Zoo asking for a job, but at 11 years old I may have been a trifle optimistic!

Life steered me in the direction of the Arts, and I first did a BA in Ceramics in Cardiff making fantasy porcelain creatures, and then my Masters Degree in the Royal College of Art; again based around animals, this time much more anthropomorphic(Johnny Morris was my idol - he who could make the animals talk).

The next 28 years saw me as Co-Director of a company in the film business making (surprise, surprise!) animals for films. I became a sculptor in clay, mainly because I had no facility for drawing, however hard I tried. I do a lot more than that now but I am still mainly a 3D person. However, about 5 years ago I had a bit of a crisis with my work, someone suggested I get a camera, a proper one, (not just a point and shoot of the sort that I was used to for taking reference shots) to try and refresh and re-inspire me. The first picture I took was embarrassing, mainly because I had the lens cap on, actually in all honesty the first YEAR was embarrassing, mainly because I was still taking ‘reference’ shots but with a more complex camera - sadly the point and shoot shots were better!

I genuinely don’t know when something clicked, but gradually I started to actually create with my images, and after I started teaching myself how to do textures and layers in Photoshop, well, everything simply changed!

The Present - a reason and a purpose-

I am a self taught photographer and editor. What I bring to my animal photography is years of looking and studying form, character, and how the play of light affects atmosphere on shape and emotion. I have re-studied the Old Masters, and their use of natural light. I use multiple bursts with my camera to try and capture a glance, a fleeting reaction, a subtle nuance of body language that changes a simple shot into a story that tells a thousand words, enhanced with softly shaping hints of light and background. Textures must never detract from the main character, but should caress and highlight.

Zoos are now Arks of huge import for the wildlife of this world. I have been to many now over the years, and when I photograph the animals within I try to create with the ensuing images a rapport with the viewer, something to make them really LOOK.

I find that sometimes I get the strongest reaction when there appears to be a human emotion within the glance of the animal, and because of that I still find anthropomorphism a fascinating and powerful thing, and feel I have only scratched the surface of what I can investigate and create. It is not only the endangered exotics though - if it breathes I love it, and domestic animals are as wonderful and complex and characterful as any wild creature.

The more I photograph and watch animals, the more I see play and humour and incredible family values within their groups that I want to capture. I see solitary beauty, I see unrestrained pleasure....and I am lost in the wonder of it. I hope you will be too.

http://www.paulinefowlerphotography.com

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Artspan VL Studio Visit with Wildlife Artist Heather Lara.

Kiss of Death © Heather Lara

Heather Lara was born and raised in New England where she developed an

appreciation for nature at an early age.  She’s lived many places since her 

childhood but now happily resides in Temecula, California with her husband, 

two small daughters and too many critters to mention them all.

A volunteer job with the Animal Department at the Living Desert in Palm Desert introduced her to a career as a serious artist.

© Heather Lara

 “When I was hired by the Graphics Department full time.  I expanded my resume by working freelance for the American Wilderness Experience, helping them open their zoo from the ground up by creating many of the exhibit graphics.  When we moved to Argentina it was a sharp detour from my rising career path but I spent my time down there collecting dogs and honing my craft - I even had my first solo exhibition at the Centro Cultural Fisherton.

© Heather Lara

Though I don’t have an art degree,  the Scientific Illustration classes I attended at the University of California at Santa Cruz helped me develop the techniques I use now and my Biology Degree has given me the necessary knowledge of form and structure to create the extremely lifelike depictions of my subjects

© Heather Lara

My painstaking attention to detail has created a portfolio  rich in the diversity of life, from  landscapes and portraits in pastel and watercolor to meticulous wildlife scenes in colored pencil.  But what I’m sharing with you here is my love of scratchboard, a unique and challenging medium that really lets me showcase my attention to minute detail.  I believe that all of nature has beauty, even the smallest insect, and I hope to share this with others through my art.”

www.heatherlara.com

A Glimpse of the Past © Heather Lara

 Interview with Heather Lara:

Where did you study art? Though I have no Art degree, I've gathered education from a number of sources.  I went to the University of California, Santa Cruz as an Art major and came out with a BA in Biology instead.  The art program was a little creepy for a 17 year old kid away from home for the first time.  The few classes I took involved a lot of nude models - picture not-so-pretty hippies and homeless people, if you've ever been to Santa Cruz you know what I mean!  I did find some graduate courses in Science Illustration that they let me take as an undergrad and it was here that I really learned interesting techniques like scratchboard, carbon dust on cronaflex and stipple.  These courses taught attention to detail, following fur patterns, muscle structure, skeletal structure down to the tiniest biological detail and it seemed to fit in with my degree.  Over the years I've just practiced my art and never shied away from new things.  I'm a bit of a hoarder when it comes to art supplies, well who am I kidding - I'm really one major tragedy away from being on the show but I have a very supportive husband that keeps me reigned in and organized.  If I read about a new art technique or medium I have to go out and buy ALL the supplies for it and try it, I teach myself through trial and error.  Sculpture, woodworking, stained glass,  pastels, you name it I have it in my over packed studio and I love it all.  I read every art magazine I can get my hands on and I ask a lot of questions from artists that inspire me, some have ignored me but others have been an invaluable part of my education, it never hurts to ask but it can really pay off. 


How would you describe your style?  Obsessive compulsive neurotically focused on detail.  I've tried to lighten up, loosen up, let go and sketch out something free and quick but I always end up going back in again and again until its hours later and looking like a photograph.  I have great respect for artists who can take a subject and create something artistic and interesting from it and yet looks nothing like real life.  I just draw what I see. 


What is the one thing most people don't know about you?  Everybody knows everything about me - I'm a consummate over-sharer.  OK ... dolls and clowns freak me out. 


Why do you paint animals? I've always loved animals since I can remember.  Anything-creepy crawly, scurrying, running or slithering I liked to pick it up and play with it.  My sister received a "How to Draw Animals" book when we were in grade school and somehow it ended up in my room and I copied every page.  I loved it!  I did my first solo art show in the library of Kelly Lane Elementary school (all of my pictures were done with crayon) and I've been drawing ever since.  I'm the kind of artist that really has to connect with my subject - it can't just be a picture in book for me.  When I travel I try to visit a zoo or animal sanctuary in whatever city or country I'm in and I spend a lot of time photographing particular animals that I make a connection with.  I contact the animal keepers where I can and get the background story for the animal and I feel like it helps me get that extra little bit of inspiration I need.  If I do a pet portrait -which is rare - I like to meet the animal and take my own photos if possible. I've learned from experience what I need to do to create a magical piece of art, it's not always possible of course but every once in a while the stars align and you even surprise yourself.

Why Scratchboard? I'm a detail-oriented artist.  I've tried to loosen up and I find myself going back to the picture again and again to add this little detail, this little fluff of hair, this little highlight.  Scratchboard is one of those mediums where you have to fill your board with lines, there are no short cuts.  I started like most artists just drawing with pencil and I found I could never keep the tip sharp enough for the detail I wanted.  I graduated to mechanical pens and found myself going smaller and smaller until I was struggling with a 00000 pen tip (I was never very good at cleaning it ).  Scratchboard gave me the surface and tools to finally get that detail I was striving for.  I've dabbled in other mediums as well but I particularly love pastels.  They speak to my messy side and I think working with all the different colors and blending and highlighting, it taught me enough about color to try coloring scratchboard.  I have little patience for anything in my life but when I sit in front of my easel to work I could be there for 12 or 14 hours straight.  It's very cathartic for me.

What's the best advice you've ever received?  I'd like to say it was the art teacher who had the whole class bring their most prized work of art to class to share only to tell us all to rip it up.  The message was supposed to be - you could always do it again and do it better.  Well that's a great thought and it would be nice if it's the truth but I'm certainly never going to try and find out!!  NO, I'd have to say the best advice I got was from an artist residing in Washington DC, can I say her name?  Jodi Walsh if I can.  She said, very simply "get over it".  What if people steal my work and use it as a screen saver or print it out and hang it in their cubicle at work?? and she said - so what? Get over it.  The likelihood that someone will take a tiny file and pirate it somehow and make millions off your work is pretty small, and if they do then you have something you can actually sue them for!  In the age of the Internet theft is inevitable, look at it as free advertising because if they think it's cool enough to swipe it they'll also show it to their friends.  In the end this isn't what we should be worrying about as aspiring artists, if you're too afraid to put yourself out there then you won't BE out there and no one will see you at all. 


What is the one thing you will never paint? Dolls and clowns

What's the most meaningful recognition you've received for your artwork?  The second picture I ever sold is still the most meaningful to me.  I've received dozens of awards and ribbons - 2 best in show even!  But this young girl in her twenties, who worked in an office somewhere - didn't make a lot of money, made payments to buy my picture and she told me that when she saw it displayed at the show it made her cry.  All she could do was stare at it and feel complete emotion and connection to what I created and it touched her so deeply she stood there in the crowd and cried.  Now this just happens to be MY favorite piece as well, of which I have a very close and emotional connection to, and I thought as I walked it to her door to deliver it that I was going to cut and run away at any moment screaming mine!  You can't have it!  But I'm glad I didn't.  I handed it over and felt content that it was going to hang in a modest home for someone who was buying it not because it was a good investment or because they are an avid art collector  but because, well,  she just loved it.  I think as artists we all want to evoke some kind of reaction in our viewers that is deep and visceral and it's a great validation of your work when you see it happen.


What are your goals for the future? I'd like to expand my audience, get represented in a few more galleries and actually pay my husband back for the hoard of art materials I've amassed over the years.  Above all my goal is to keep having fun.  I'm blessed with two beautiful little girls and they deserve the bulk of my attention right now, I figure I'll have plenty of time to devote to my art career when they're in their teens and hate me.


What galleries represent your work? Celebration Fine Art Gallery, San Diego, California  and Metalography Gallery, Temecula, CA

UK Wildlife Artist Robbie Graham Featured Studio Visit.

'A Brush With The Law'

Always Alert  © Robbie Graham

Robbie Graham is a UK based artist born in West Germany and currently living in Tenterden, Kent,UK.  Robbie served in the R.A.F before joining Kent Police, where he served for twenty two years. Robbie left the police this year to follow his passion to create his photographic like paintings and at the same time, support a number of conservation programs. Robbie had an extremely interesting career as a police officer, having served his last eight years as a detective chief inspector. He was the borough commander at Maidstone, the county town of Kent. Robbie said, ' It was a great place to work and as the commander of the station I had the privilege of hanging lots of my wildlife paintings all over the building.  It made the station bright and very different from the norm! Robbie  also spent five years as the Head of Kent Special Branch where he was responsible for all counter terrorism operations across the county of Kent.  Robbie said' I found this time in career the most challenging. In  2009 Robbie was selected to undertake a secondment in  South Australia for three months. There he was sworn in as an uniformed Australian police chief inspector and headed up operations in Port Adelaide. Robbie said ' I really enjoyed my time in Australia, having never been there before. It also gave me a wonderful operation to explore the wonderful wildlife there in my down time'.

Whist in the police Robbie held a number of fund raising solo exhibitions where he raised much needed funds for Children Victims Of Crime and big cat conservation programs.

Robbie began painting approximately 10 years ago and since then his work has become so popular that he decided to 'make the leap' from police officer to professional wildlife artist . His work can now be seen in collections world wild. He is a signature member of Arts For Conservation and also a featured artist for Daler Rowney, one of the world's largest art material suppliers . His art work ' Always Alert' is used  by Daler Rowney for their header boards displaying their designer gouache range.

Intensity © Robbie Graham

Into the Light © Robbie Graham

 Robbie is self taught and extremely passionate about conservation. He has provided a number of originals to fund raising charities in order to support them.  Robbie said' I am always inspired by the many wonderful wildlife artists across the world. Art to me is about creating something that 'connects ' with the viewer and seeks to make them stand back and really appreciate the wonderful creatures we are all so privileged to share this world with. Capturing the true spirit of nature is so important to me . I will always make the eyes the focal point in many of my paintings'.  

Memories © Robbie Graham

Robbie says,  'my art is not about the application of paint , It's about making a connection between the viewer and the subject of the painting'.   I started using gouache having been inspired by Cark Brender's a true master of wildlife art.     

Robbie's work can be seen by visiting http://Robbiegrahamart.co.uk or Robbiegrahamart on Face Book or Twitter.