Developing a Still Life Paintings Art Collection

Collecting Resource Guide

Laura Robb, Blue Cup with Crabapples, oil, 10 x 16.

Discovering the prescient power and timeless appeal of still life art. A Quiet Dynamic David Riedel’s still-life paintings reveal a subtle sense of movement, mystery, and depth

By G ussie F auntleroy da vi d r ie e l

As the pale light fades into dusk through north-facing skylights in his Portland, OR, studio, painter David Riedel sits quietly, watching a painting on his easel. His hands are in his lap. His tools at this moment are his eyes, closely observing how changes happen in the painting’s areas of light and dark— seeing how shadows and highlights fall on a brown clay jug surrounded by au- tumn leaves. What he’s hoping to see is the painting’s sense of mystery and depth increase in proportion to the studio’s disappearing light. “It may be a quiet still life, but it’s very dynamic,” the artist points out, his eyes still on the easel. “It’s not a station- ary thing at all. You have to be passion- ate about some idea, and then build in the tensions and energy and flow. There should be a lot going on. And the fascination for me is: How well can I see what’s truly there?” As it turns out, since moving from northern New Mexico to Portland a few years ago, Riedel has had to work harder to see subtle variations in color and other nuances as he paints. For the previous 10 years he observed his paintings in the sharp, high-altitude light. That’s what filled the studio he and his wife, Rachel, built—along with an adobe house—on a mountainside north of Taos. When they moved to the Northwest, Riedel found himself facing a re-education in the Turquoise and Green, oil, 20 x 16. effects of light.

www.SouthwestArt.com 2 Two White Onions, oil, 11 x 14.

“Up here, the light is soft and silvery, Drawing and other creative ac- he entered college at Northern Arizona and I have to struggle to see things. tivities have been central to Riedel’s life University, he headed for the architec- There’s not the sharp distinction be- since childhood. He was raised in Indiana ture department. But he soon switched tween warm light and cool light,” he ex- in the early 1960s, the son of a banker fa- majors, having realized architecture was plains. “I think it’s been really good for ther and a mother who loved to sit down no match for his growing interest in art. me. It pushes me to work harder to see, at the baby grand piano at night, playing He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in and the result is that I’ve learned to study elegantly while her four children were in fine arts in printmaking. He had a vague what I’m looking at more closely, to be bed. His was a “Norman Rockwell boy- sense of abstract expressionism but did very observant and careful with color.” hood,” the artist remembers, with bike not possess the fine art fundamentals a Riedel’s hard work has paid off. Already rides and playing in the nearby woods as future realist painter would need. For an award-winning artist whose still lifes daily fare. The exception for young David several years after graduation, in what are collected nationally and internation- was periodic downtime mandated by se- he describes as a “time of great energy ally, he received the top prize—the Amer- vere asthma. Confined to bed for as long and little direction,” he created land- ican National Award of Excellence—at as a week at a time, he would spend his scapes in pastels. “Hopefully,” he says, the Oil Painters of America national ju- hours reading and drawing. “I learned to smiling, “those early pieces will remain ried exhibition this past May. He also do those quiet things,” he relates. forever lost!” earned a merit award at this year’s Salon Surrounded by beautiful objects, in- Then, in 1986, he was introduced to International, which is held each spring cluding antiques, Chinese scrolls, and the Art Students League of New York. It at Greenhouse Gallery of Fine Art in San landscape paintings, Riedel absorbed was a career-sparking stroke of fate. He Antonio, TX. And while still life remains an aesthetic appreciation for such ob- enrolled there and everything changed. his primary genre, the 53-year-old artist jects. And while he was always encour- “For me, the concept of painting, as dis- recently has also begun showing his figu- aged in his love of art, there were no role tinct from drawing, was a revelation,” he rative and plein-air landscape work. models for making it a career. So when recalls, noting it was not until he was 30

www.SouthwestArt.com 3 that he picked up a paintbrush. His first woods away from everything and just car painting teacher, and one of the most camp and paint for a week—that’s one of influential figures during this period, my great loves.” was renowned still-life painter David Over the years Riedel has had ample Leffel. Sherrie McGraw and other in- opportunity to spend time in nature and structors also made a strong impres- paint on location. After Arizona he lived sion, and important living artists such as briefly in southern Colorado; in 1992 he Richard Schmid have left an inevitable moved to New Mexico to be close to mark on his work. a community of other artists in Taos. From 1986 to 1991, Riedel spent three to He met Rachel in a gallery in Taos and four months each year living in a friend’s they were married in 1994. Then came apartment in New York City and im- a daughter, Danica, and soon David and mersing himself in art. “The Art League Rachel began the “enormous, 10-year started teaching me the fundamentals of art project” of building an off-the-grid, drawing and painting,” he recounts. “But passive-solar adobe house and studio just as important was learning how to go from the ground up. about learning—how to pull each paint- Today the family has settled in urban ing a little farther along.” Completely Portland, near the Willamette River. Es- engrossed, he would paint and draw 12 pecially on blustery winter days, Riedel hours a day for weeks on end. When he finds a measure of wildness and solitude  Red Onions, oil, 14 x 15. was finally exhausted, he would return kayaking on the river. In a more con-  Enamel Pan and Peaches, oil, 11 x 15. for a few months to an isolated cabin in a tained way, his studio—in a former fac- canyon near Sedona, AZ. tory converted to art spaces—is a quiet There, alone, the artist more fully place as well. The artist has covered the pots, objects he collected during travels absorbed and explored what he had studio walls with neutral-colored fabric in Asia, and an assortment of dried flow- learned in New York. “The contrast was to reduce reflections that would inter- ers, branches, and leaves. wonderful,” he remarks. “Even now, to fere with shadows and color in his work. Things get shuffled around on the get out in a very quiet place, out in the Around him are shelves filled with vases, shelves over time, which often sparks the idea for a painting. Other works are born of a simple color combination or an intriguing shape. ENAMEL PAN AND PEACHES began when Riedel noticed the blue enamel pan he has used many times on camping trips. “One day it just caught my eye and I knew there was a painting there,” he recalls. In another instance, a branch of perfect red maple leaves hung drying on the wall for months before it became the inspiration for CLAY POT AND FALL LEAVES [see page 5]. However an arrangement starts, its journey to a finished painting taps into a wealth of knowledge the artist has ac- quired over nearly 25 years. Now, with technical painting skills under his belt, he is free to approach a work from various angles, depending on what interests him at the moment. “It’s never just stuff on a table,” he explains, referring to the experience of visually exploring an arrangement. “It’s all about the relationships. Sometimes I’ll decide to play with edges more, or I’ll set up a good framework of shadows and work on that, or I’ll think of the image in a more abstract way, as pieces of color. These are all just internal games I play in the process of painting. “It’s never easy,” he acknowledges.

www.SouthwestArt.com 4 Clay Pot and Fall Leaves, oil, 24 x 22.

“Each time I set objects on the table it’s be limited to the studio. It’s your life. the yard, a neighbor’s strikingly beauti- a different environment or there are a It’s part of everything,” he says. Echoing ful cat is grooming itself under a tree in different set of parameters I set for my- the advice of a respected instructor, he the evening light. “Oh man,” he says, “if I self. So it’s always a challenge—which it adds: “When you see it now, do it now. In had my sketchbook with me—what a fan- should be.” other words, when you see something tastic pose!” F Another means of honing observational beautiful, don’t put it off; you might not and drawing skills is to always carry a see it again.” Colorado-based Gussie Fauntleroy also writes for Art sketchbook, something Riedel did dur- Settling into a chair in his front yard, & Antiques, New Mexico Magazine, Native Peoples, ing his student years and is training Riedel smiles ruefully as he discovers and the Santa Fean. himself to do again. “Creativity can’t just he’s just broken his own rule. Across

This content has been abridged from an original article written by Gussie Fauntleroy. © F+W. All rights reserved. F+W grants permission for any or all pages in this premium to be copied for personal use. www.SouthwestArt.com 5 Lipsticks & Nail Polishes #14, Oil, 20 X 20.

Lipstick tubes, high-heeled pumps, and trendy handbags. These are a few of Jeannie Paty’s favorite things. The Jeannie Paty Colorado painter is known for casting her artistic eye on ordinary objects and A fresh take on the still-life genre then bringing a fresh sense of color and high energy to her tableaux. Earlier this year, Paty won high praise from Califor- nia painter Brian Blood, who selected her painting LIPSTICKS & NAIL POLISHES #14

www.SouthwestArt.com 6 such seemingly playful works is carefully planned to convey what she may not be able to express in words. “Paintings can be a way to communicate in the same way music can evoke the right emotions you feel or want to express,” she explains. Paty relishes playing with light, me- dium, and dark values. Pushing the me- dium values towards either the light or dark allows her to create a stronger com- position, she says. “Whether my painting is of a figure or an inanimate object like a shoe, I am drawn to the rhythm and harmony of things,” she says. “How a person may shift his or her weight or the ran- domness of a tossed-off pair of shoes is usually what catches my eye.” Paty also believes in painting directly from life. If she does use photos as reference, she first creates color studies from life and then keeps them close by as her main reference material. Like many artists, she strongly adheres to the idea that something is lost when paintings origi- nate from photographs. As a child, Paty says, she was highly visual and often studied the way light moved and created things like long shad-

“Whether my painting is of a figure or an inanimate object like a shoe, I am drawn to the rhythm and harmony of things.”

Sunflowers, Blue Plate & Art Book, Oil, 20 X 16. ows at sunset. Raised in Maryland, she spent many days as a teenager in nearby Washington, DC, perusing the paintings as a finalist in a national online compe- She is also quick to point out that while at the National Gallery of Art. She later tition. “I felt Jeannie captured a bit of her subject matter may seem whimsical earned a degree in industrial design from Wayne Thiebaud in this one,” Blood not- on the surface, she is very serious about Arizona State University in Tempe and ed. “I’m a sucker for well-drafted works her art. Her subject matter of choice is also studied painting at the Art Students with juicy paint.” merely a vehicle to explore nuances of League of Denver. Recently another of Paty’s lively tab- colors and shapes. In other words, she After numerous art classes and years leaux, SUNFLOWER, BLUE PLATE & ART views landscapes, objects, and figures in spent in her studio, Paty says she has de- BOOK, won an honorable mention award the abstract. veloped a strong sense of what she wants at the prestigious Salon International Lately Paty has been drawn to the col- her art to accomplish. “I’m an artist who show at Greenhouse Gallery of Fine Art ors and shapes of accessories like shoes appreciates beauty and how it can impact in San Antonio, TX. The still life hangs and purses—a fascination that developed a person. People’s souls can be renewed alongside an array of paintings by estab- after examining some of her friends’ pos- and spirits lifted by a piece of art that is lished artists such as Dan Beck, Jeff Legg, sessions. “I’m lucky to have such stylish created by a living, breathing person,” and Robert Spooner. Paty admits 2010 has girlfriends, and I’ve raided many of their she says. “That’s what I want my art to been a really good year so far. closets,” she jokes. The visual structure of accomplish.” —Bonnie Gangelhoff

This content has been abridged from an original article written by Bonnie Gangelhoff. © F+W. All rights reserved. F+W grants permission for any or all pages in this premium to be copied for personal use. www.SouthwestArt.com 7 Lilies and Freesia, oil, 18 x 18.  Sunflowers in Blue Teapot, oil, 17 x 13. L a u ra Ro bb

When an artist works hard, the re- sulting painting can look like it involved a lot of effort. Or, an artist can work hard to make a painting look effortless—“as if blown on in one puff,” as painter William Merritt Chase once put it. Still-life painter Laura Robb is of the A Visual latter persuasion, although she jokes that it may not be the best career move. “I like my paintings to look effortless, which is kind of a dumb thing to want because, Conversation really, the public is more impressed with Laura Robb captures the interplay between things that look difficult to paint. Usually the more detail they see, the better,” the the subjects of her still-life paintings 54-year-old artist observes, her Oklaho- man drawl and unhurried manner coun- terbalanced by a quick, engaging wit. “To me, it’s exciting to make it look effortless, just because it is so hard to do.” Robb’s observations may contain some By G ussie F auntleroy truth, but viewers and collectors seem to

www.SouthwestArt.com 8 have no trouble appreciating—and pur- compound was built when [Russian paint- packed, and was back in a month.” chasing—her richly hued, vividly expres- er Nicolai] Fechin was alive. It was part sive still-life arrangements of such ob- of the legendary old Taos,” she explains. Setting off on an adventure alone jects as flowers, vases, bowls, and Asian “I said if I could get an apartment like was nothing new for Robb. At 19, immedi- ceramic urns. The Taos-based artist’s that, I’d move here. The artist who lived ately following high school graduation and work is widely collected and has earned there said, ‘The one next door is vacant.’ I having worked to pay her own expenses, numerous awards over the years, includ- walked over there, looked in, went home, she moved to New York City and spent a ing the People’s Choice Award at the 2009 Western Rendezvous of Art in Helena, MT. That award went to CRIMSON POPPIES, a painting of poppies and orchids in a vibrant red glass vase beside an antique sug- ar bowl. Having the piece selected as the viewers’ favorite was a pleasant surprise for the artist, especially in an exhibition known more for wildlife and western art than still life. “You could have knocked me over with a feather,” she admits. “I really didn’t expect it at all.” The painting has been selected as the poster image for this year’s Western Rendezvous. The award was a fitting tribute to an artist’s journey that began years ago in Tulsa. Robb describes her younger self as being fairly shy and waffling between act- ing out and trying to become invisible. “A lot of the time I was outdoors,” she recalls, “and I must have been pretty self-directed because my parents always insisted that I raised myself. I distinctly remember that my favorite activity in kindergarten was painting and that cats and dogs were my best friends. Same as today.” These days, in the attractive home and studio she designed and built on the out- skirts of Taos, Robb’s circle of best friends includes two rescued dogs and three rescued cats, most of whom came to her with physical disabilities. “Going to the vet is my social life,” she quips. Scooter the cat, a longtime housemate with nerve-damaged back legs, gets around handily in a specially designed cart with wheels. A cat named Gray was partially paralyzed after being electro- cuted on a power line. She can walk now, although she still falls over sometimes, the artist explains. And Skyler, a cat with twisted hind legs, became part of the family after Robb drove a thousand miles to an animal sanctuary in Utah and paid an adoption fee to get him. Robb’s own move to Taos came in 1986 after experiencing northern New Mexico on a painting trip, during which she visited an artist in a compound of venerable adobes divided into apartments. “The Crimson Poppies, oil, 24 x 18.

www.SouthwestArt.com 9 tinues. “When I went back and visited Mi- chael Aviano about 10 years later, I told him I think the only thing a good teacher can teach you is how to teach yourself. He just kind of slumped and smiled and said ‘Ex- actly!’, happy that someone finally got it.” Robb is on the other end of the teacher/ student relationship these days, leading periodic painting workshops in Santa Fe. As she demonstrates her methods, she becomes even more aware of how her approach to painting—and seeing—diverges from the academic model. For example, she never draws outlines of objects before starting to paint. Instead her goal is to perceive and render her subjects purely in terms of color and shape and to “keep things accurate yet unrecognizable for as long as I can,” she explains. “My theory is that once you have enough information on your canvas that you can name the object, the wrong part of your brain starts trying to take over and run the show.” Robb maintains this counterintuitive approach, as she describes it, through such tactics as focusing on the shape of spaces between and around things, rather than the form of the object itself. She also

Fish Bowl and Peppers, oil, 9 x 9. year studying with acclaimed painter Mi- skills from studying with Aviano. And chael Aviano. She rented a series of apart- just as important, she absorbed his “real ments—one, the former home of prosti- love and enthusiasm for art. He’s just one tutes, brought unexpected knocks on the of those people who are artists even when door—and worked as a waitress in jazz they’re asleep,” she says. Aviano made clubs where she met trumpet player Chet suggestions to his students on museum Baker and other musical greats. shows to see, which introduced Robb to Studying with Aviano had been the such artists as 18th-century French still- suggestion of a painter in Tulsa with life painter Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin. whom she had started taking instruction Robb’s next major source of artistic at age 16. At that point in her life, painting encouragement was internationally re- partly served as an escape from school, nowned painter Richard Schmid, whom which did not suit her temperament. “I she met through a gallery near Tulsa after wanted to drop out. I told my parents that returning from New York. Sending him Norman Rockwell dropped out when he slides of her work, she received letters was 13, but they said just hold your nose back with words of critique and support. “I and get through it.” Needing only a half- think he was way, way over-complimentary time schedule for enough credits to grad- of my work!” she insists. “But I lived to get uate, Robb signed up for a daily half-day those ’atta-girl letters. It was such a boost. of art. The course offered a rigid, classical “And really, that’s the way it should be, approach to painting, but it set her feet on because the technical information is out a fortuitous path. there; what you need most is the encour- In New York, Robb gained technical agement to find it on your own,” she con- Arrangement in Blue and White, oil, 12 x 9.

www.SouthwestArt.com 10 Pansies, oil, 10 x 10. frequently squints, depriving her eyes of parts of the image are moving in and out ful of sand. If you close your hand tightly clear focus and preventing her mind from of focus. “Practically every student I have all the sand pours out, but as long as your grabbing onto the idea of a flower or vase. ever had has wanted to know how to lose hand is open, it’s okay. “The best way I’ve come up with to de- edges,” Robb notes. “But in my approach, “My work is always moving in the direc- scribe what I’m after is that when setting the edges that are lost are just the ones tion of leaving more of the details out, as a up the still life, I try to get the objects that never got found.” way of making the real story of the paint- to ‘talk’ to each other. And then I try to PANSIES is among the artist’s favorite ing more important,” she reflects. “To do paint that conversation.” recent works. The painting of white and that requires a lot of subtle judgment calls. The result is an arresting mixture of red blooms in a black vase was almost So I find that as time goes by I’m painting vibrant movement and serene calm, with abandoned at one point. Yet after she ba- slower, but I’m happier with the result.” F flowers and background alike sometimes sically gave up on it, waited a while, and appearing to dance to an intense yet com- came back to it, the painting somehow Colorado-based Gussie Fauntleroy also writes for Art positionally pleasing gust of wind. Some shifted into gear. “Sometimes it works & Antiques, New Mexico Magazine, Native Peoples, edges are sharp and well defined while best that way—when you just let go,” she and the Santa Fean. others are amorphous and fluid, as if observes. “It’s like trying to hold a hand-

Kyle Polzin is a sell out. Every-thing By M ark Mu ssari he paints sells, and he is quickly becom- ing a sought-after and respected artist in the Southwest. From 2007 to 2008, he managed to sell every painting he pro- duced for three highly reputable shows. In November 2007, he had his first major one-man show at Southwest Gallery in Dallas, where all 27 of his original works sold on opening night. The following

www.SouthwestArt.com 12 was always drawing.” As a child, Kyle recalls that he, too, was “always drawing and playing with clay, working with my hands.” His parents frequently referred to their son as an artist. “Early on I had that identity,” he says. “I knew that career was in front of me.” In addition, both of his grandparents were skilled carpen- ters. “My paternal grandfather worked in stained glass and built furniture,” he notes. “We were always building something together.” He adds that both grand- fathers were “very meticulous” in their work, a trait that would surface in his own methodical approach: “I’ve always liked to take things apart and see how they work. I appreciate ingenuity.” Eventually, his family moved to Vic- toria, TX, where Polzin attended Victo- ria College for an associate’s degree. “At that point I was slowly starting to get more serious about my art,” he says, nod- ding to the efforts of Larry Shook, his art teacher. Shook took a hard line with the then-uncommitted Polzin, prodding him to develop his nascent talents. In an effort to do so, and while still in college, the artistic youth decided to take a work- Intermission, oil, 14 x 18. Hydrangeas, oil, 28 x 30.

year, he created a dozen paintings for a spring show at the Rockport Center for the Arts in Rockport, TX, selling all of them by the end of the first week. And in August, at Port A Gallery in Port Aransas, TX, all 12 of his new pieces sold by draw the night of the show. How does the 36-year-old artist ac- count for his stellar success? “I’ve been really fortunate to have the amount of interest I’ve received,” he responds. “I’m just happy people appreciate the crafts- manship and quality of work I’ve put into my art.” Obviously, a good number of collectors do. They are especially drawn to the seductive attention to detail that defines so much of the Texas native’s art, particularly in his warm, rich still lifes. And then there is the undeniable technical proficiency that emanates from each canvas.

Polzin was born in Cuero, TX, to a family full of artistic talents. “My dad majored in art in college,” he says. “He

www.SouthwestArt.com 13 Lookin’ for Eight, oil, 18 x 28. shop in Austin with Dalhart Windberg, the established Texas artist renowned “I want my still lifes to look like for his mastery of light and color. “I was already familiar with his work,” says Pol- zin. “That experience really solidified it a memory you are recalling.” for me. I knew I had to pursue it.” After college, Polzin moved to Port Aransas, TX, where he began working canvas, enabling paint to fill spaces more tively simple: “I try not to clutter the in graphic and web design. To this day, quickly and increasing the overall lumi- scene.” Instead, he focuses in on his his background in commercial art contin- nosity. “I also use a smooth canvas,” ex- subjects, often filling much of the can- ues to help him: “I can sketch out art—in plains Polzin. “It gives my work a sheen vas with just one or two items. “I ask color—on the computer and can compose and enables me to achieve a high level of myself, ‘What’s a good way to showcase a scene using those computer skills.” He detail.” Through studying Windberg’s this piece?’” In many of his paintings, ev- adds that he can take a photograph of a approach to art, Polzin feels he, too, has eryday objects appear bathed in a golden still-life arrangement and manipulate it become “influenced by the old masters— light, imparting a romantic and some- to the point “where I know I want to take especially Rembrandt and Vermeer and what nostalgic glow. “I want my still lifes it. I try to eliminate the guesswork so I their style of lighting.” to look like a memory you are recalling,” can be more efficient.” Polzin points out that a good 80 to 90 the artist says. Maintaining a friendship with Wind- percent of his paintings are still lifes; the In this sense, a narrative evolves when berg, Polzin eventually worked up the rest are mostly landscapes and water- looking at Polzin’s canvases. A cowboy nerve to show him some paintings. “He scapes, inspired by his early days grow- hat and spurs, a weathered duck de- told me to bring him my work and he ing up along the Gulf Coast. These equally coy and shotgun shells, or a branding would criticize it,” he remembers. The deft paintings possess a somewhat looser iron and worn work gloves—these ordi- budding artist began to recognize the style, and their perspective is surprising- nary items enter the landscape of mem- influence of the old masters on his men- ly broad. It is the attention to detail in his ory when rendered in his quiet, pensive tor’s paintings: “I would look at his paint- elegant still-life canvases, however, that paintings. “My subject matter often has a ings and wonder—what was the trick?” truly reveals the artist’s astute painterly masculine feel to it,” he notes. Yet he also He soon realized there was no trick. “His eye. “I love getting into detail,” he says. confirms an attention to presentation and idea was to paint like the old masters “I like to get up close and capture patinas a careful rendering of fabrics or porcelain but find a technique to do so faster,” re- and surfaces.” and glass surfaces, like a wine carafe or lates Polzin. Windberg employs a smooth Compositionally, Polzin keeps it rela- flower vase. The spartan settings, with

www.SouthwestArt.com 14 their deep chiaroscuro and backgrounds “with that era of metal and leather—that storming.” Fortunately he gets help from in sepias and burnt umbers, set these ob- pre-plastic era.” The objects, revealing Leigh, whom he refers to as his collabora- jects in relief, both visually and themati- signs of use and time, rest on a striped tor. “We’re always coming up with new cally. “I highlight details to tell a story,” baseball jersey. “I like to add cloth to cre- ideas,” he says. “I couldn’t do it without he says. ate movement,” says Polzin. “It softens her.” This nostalgic, narrative effect surfac- the painting.” Compositionally, this piece Perhaps the best person to define the es in a piece like BLUES KING, in which also offers a prime example of the artist’s appeal of Polzin’s art is his former mentor. an electric guitar, an old amplifier, and spatial sensibility. The horizontal bat and “There’s a feeling in his work that’s eas- a microphone stand out in relief against the medley of textures in the assembled ily identifiable,” observes Dalhart Wind- the somber tones and dark shadows sur- objects keep the eye moving around the berg. “You can look across a room and rounding them. “Those objects are not picture plane. “The objects tell their own know immediately that he painted it.” typically presented in that light,” says story,” he adds. “It’s neat to compose Windberg warmly recalls the burgeoning Polzin. The effect is arresting: The ob- those pieces together as a whole.” artist he first met many years ago: “I knew jects appear as they would in recollec- The artist maintains a studio in his right off the bat that he had talent. You tion, items once used but now abandoned home, which he says can be challeng- don’t run across it very often. He has a to memory. ing as he, his wife, Leigh, and their two tremendous future ahead of him.” Those A similar quality pervades the textural small girls are often home at the same collectors who keep snatching up Polzin’s painting titled THE PATH OF LEGENDS. In time. “It can be tough to keep normal work would undoubtedly agree. F this piece, Polzin portrays old baseball hours,” he admits. “So, I get a lot of work memorabilia—vintage Americana. “I am done at night.” He also confesses to being Mark Mussari, Ph.D., writes frequently about art fascinated with old things,” he comments, “always in a work mode, always brain- and design.

The Path of Legends, oil, 16 x 26.

This content has been abridged from an original article written by Mark Mussari, Ph.D. © F+W Media, Inc. All rights reserved. F+W Media grants permission for any or all pages in this premium to be copied for personal use. www.SouthwestArt.com 15