HERE'S WHAT TOM HAS TO SAY

Who are my favourite contemporary artists?

Answering this is like trying to answer what is my favorite fruit. In different genres I like different artists. For pure craftmanship, I don't believe that anyone can compare to Maxfield Parrish. As I'm a craftsman in my own domain, I can appreciate it in other fields. I really enjoy looking at the work of some of the Fantasy and Sci-Fi artists currently popular. These include Boris Vallejo, Julia Bell, Roweena, and for sheer fun, Frazetta. There are lots of others that bear looking at too. I guess I'm more into a realism or a realistic style of art rather than impressionistic styles. I really enjoy figurative art too, although I find it my weakest point in my own work.

My favourites from history?

It's hard to pick a single artist, so again I'll have to pick a group, and I have three favorites. The first are the Pre-Raphaelites from around the 1840's or so in England. One of my favorites from that era is Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema. And in the good old USA, the Hudson River School. A good example of this is the landscape work of George Inness. A little more contemporary, 1890's thru the early 20th century, would be the Art Nouveau movement in architecture, art and also in houshold items. For the artists here you have Louise Comfort Tiffany, Egon Scheile, Gaudi, Gustav Klimt, and Aubrey Beardsley.

My favourite or most inspirational Painter Artist?

I don't think I have a favorite "Painter" artist. I have artists I like who use Painter as their main medium, but an artist is an artist regardless of medium. As far as being inspired, I take a lot of inspiration from our own group. I'll start something and the right word or two will aim me in an entirely new direction. Some kinda connection with my thoughts, their thoughts, and the creative process are at work. Outside of our group, two artists that really blow me away are Rebecca Kimmel and Robert Chang. Both Paint in a soft realistic style I wish I could come close to doing myself. Perhaps in another 20 years or so...

My favourite Painter Brushes? and Why? I'm really liking the artist oils, especialy the impasto varieties. Feels like I'm really painting on canvas with the 3D appearance of the brush strokes. Then to go over them with the Impasto Palette Knife... How real can you get!? Sometimes I'm tempted to open my jar of turps (the real turps, not that synthetic stuff, that's for sissies,) just to really feel like I'm painting. That at least gives me the two senses out of four to feel like reality.

What do I want the viewer to feel when they look at my art?

Great Awe!......Kidding, I don't feel I have enough of a handle on my art to elicit any deep emotion. If they just enjoy looking at a "pretty" picture at this point, I feel I'm doing something. I consider myself a student, and I have a hell of a lot to learn. Later, "awe" would be cool, but it ain't happening for awhile yet.

Have you ever painted with traditional media? and if so what kind of media?

Yep, started out with Jon Gnagy's "Learn to Draw" art kit (He was also on TV.) when I was just a little kid. I think that was yesterday. I've used all the standard media, from pen and ink through oils and acrylics. Primarily though, I used oil. Still do, although not as much as I'd like.

How do you feel that you are paving the way for digital art to have a real impact on the art scene?

I guess by just using digital work to show my clients, they are impressed most of the time. I started more than one on the digital path with digital artwork and tools, including Painter. I just advocate on a one to one basis.

Art and my Life

Tell us about how you became interested in Painter, if you painted before traditionally and a bit about your life and how Painter fits in it.

I'm not quite a postwar baby boomer, born in 1945, so maybe my Social Security is safe. I always sketched and painted since I was a wee one. Took art all through High Scool, had a couple of evening art classes at Farleigh Dickson University in New Jersey, then four+ years in the US Navy.

While in the Navy, I started jewelry making and designing as a hobby. I did this professionally for years and years , then discovered computers in the early 90's. My first program was Macromedia Sketch, then an early version of Corel Draw, finally Painter 2 and every version since then.

I always wanted to do more realistic versions of my work, and Painter is the means. I do combine it with the Photoshop CS3 suite every now and then, but Painter does about 80% of my projects. Painter is great for getting ideas across to my clients, it's actually a lot easier to use than the Photoshop/Illustrator combo. You have a lot better vector work control built into Painter all by itself. That's a feature I use a lot in my professional work. All that, and you can just cut loose and have a blast with it too!

Tom Tilney

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