Artists Registry

My work is not merely to decorate a wall;
Rather to absorb the viewer in visual
Phenomenon, and view with a gaze of
Vernal openness, to look with new eyes.

Born in Wisconsin, Jim started etching his marks at a early age. "I remember my earliest artistic attempts. I had an orange crayon, tracing ‘shadow’ faces on my walls while standing in my crib. I might have been two years old. My parents weren’t too pleased with my self-portrait. But as I grew older, everyone around me supported my drives, and encouraged my talent for art." Jim first attended Layton School of Art in Milwaukee in 1964, and was initially enrolled in Illustration and Advertising. "My Father wanted a more practical goal for me other than fine artist." Jim had influences from some famous his painter/teachers; Edmund Lewandowski (1914-1998) American "precisionist" painter, and noted painter Robert Von Neumann (American 1888-1976). Layton at that time was widely known for innovative teaching styles.

Seeking a more fine-art direction, he then attended Minneapolis School of Art in 1966, a broader base for painting style and technique. While there, Jim had a guest instructor named Christo Javacheff, Later known as Christo, the famous Installation artist. He wasn’t famous then. He was new, and became an art school teacher, known for Marin county’s "California Running Fence" in 1982, and New York’s Central Park "Gates" in 2005. For the semester project at Minneapolis, Christo had 200 art students walk into a huge weather balloon and the event are described as follows in his biography: 42,390 Cubic feet Package October 1966 at the Walker Art Center and the Minneapolis School of Art. Length: 18 meters (60 feet) Polyethylene: 720 square meters (8,000 square feet). Manila rope: 914 meters (3,000 feet) Duration: Three days. He taught an "open" class called Constructions and Installation Art for the Semester.

Jim learned from Christo’s boldness in the face of ridicule, to create what your "art energy" wants.

He had always sold paintings to supplement his art school education. He came west to California in 1968. He was always, from very early on, attracted to landscapes in the American West, even before he had ever seen the West. He launched a successful career in graphics, while selling his paintings throughout the San Francisco Bay area. Jim was part of the movement on the West Coast, of the "Visionary Style" in the late 60’s and 70’s. and worked a large volume of fantasy landscapes Jim had won competitions, was in juried shows, fairs, and galleries from San Francisco to Monterey/Carmel.

As the economics of the artist life style were challenging, he took a job with a growing family to support. He went to work in the fire service. Because of his artistic background, attention to detail, Jim became a cartographer, and helped to implement the 911 system in California in 1976. He drew fire response maps, and also illustrated children’s fire safety materials and books. He found himself enjoying this job and its benefits to everyone around him. He became a paid firefighter in 1978. "My experience in the Fire Service, affecting people, has enriched his perspectives of Life, Nature, and Passion. As his career was coming to a milestone ending, and as retirement approached, he begin anew to feed his drives, and re-entered art in 1998. He started with watercolors, as they were easy for him to refresh himself, but since 2002, he’s been painting as he had since art school. in oils.

"I have drawn my inspirations from Early Chinese landscapes; from the Romanticism period, and the American Hudson River School, French Impressionism, and Seurat with his pointillism, the Early Californian Plein Air movement. Georgia O’Keeffe and Maynard Dixon, and their sense of place with a pioneer spirit, of the Great American Southwest. And of course, Salvador Dali, the most impressive influential artist for me. One important contemporary master is Eyvind Earle, and his modern pointillism.

"My paintings entice the senses to explore beyond what their eyes tell them. I want my art to evoke a new perception of what is always there, the consciousness of color, and my passion to create the illusion." Jim maintains a studio in Aptos, California, on Monterey Bay, and has found his "art energy".