Tyler Vance was working at a car battery company in his early 20’s when his wife encouraged him to return to school and he finished an MFA. He continued painting and started his teaching career as an adjunct instructor at Utah State University and then moved to his current home in Massachusetts. He teaches at various colleges and produces gallery art in his own studio. I find it remarkable that he limits his palette to six colors.

What is your work style? What is your studio like? What tools and mediums do you like to use? I’ve recently discovered the benefit of building maquettes for reference. Much of my subject matter and backdrops are difficult to find reference for, so building them myself has proven invaluable. They aren’t really sculptures in their own right – just quick models made from clay and cardboard to give me an idea of form and lighting.

My method of approaching a new painting is similar to a traditional step-by-step approach: Preliminary sketches, building maquettes, photographing, compositing and editing photos, more sketches, color studies, and a final comprehensive charcoal drawing before finally getting to the painting. It’s more time-intensive than an alla prima or plein air approach, but it yields the best results for me.

As for the actual oil painting, I exclusively paint on wood panel and use pumice grounds rather than gesso for priming. I find gesso too plasticky. After drawing in the linear composition, I paint in several layers of glazing and scumbling, going back and forth between transparent and opaque paint until I get the desired value, texture and history to the surface.

My studio is fairly straightforward. I have three main areas: painting, building, and staging. My painting area has my easels and taboret. For my main easel I constructed a simple frame with movable dowels against the wall to accommodate larger paintings. My building area has a workbench and all my tools for building supports or prepping panels. And my staging area is made up of movable shelves, multiple lights, and all of my props. This is where I set up scenes to paint from or take photographs.

You have incredible control over value in a limited palette. How did this style develop? I’ve always been first and foremost a draftsman. Painting has never come easy for me; I’ve had to work hard to find a method of painting that suits me best, and it’s still an evolving process.

I’ve used the same few colors almost exclusively now for several years: an earth tone palette consisting of yellow ochre, burnt sienna, burnt umber, raw umber, ultramarine blue, and titanium white – that’s it. I’m still exploring the range of subtle tonalities you can achieve with these colors. In this way, I don’t feel like I am actually “painting” when I work; rather it feels to me more like drawing and sculpture – building up palpable layers of texture and value.

You have said, “Bones and old things are vestiges of another life. They are not dead, but resurrected as artifacts and objects of our reverence.” Explain. There is a transformation that takes place when objects become artifacts. What once had life is now a piece of history, a relic that not only tells a story (often incomplete) about what it was, but is now a new thing with new meaning. For example, a museum takes an ancient pot used for storage and elevates it into a revered object. I try to capture that same reverence in my work, and to imply a ritualistic significance in the objects.

Bones and skulls are so prevalent in my work because they perfectly embody this idea. They are the ultimate artifacts, rife with significance and past life. They’re beautiful too; striking the right balance between organic and geometric, and they’re rich with texture. Unfortunately, both sides of the spectrum revile skulls: to the institutional artist they’re cliché; while to the general public they’re too macabre. But I can’t help myself from being drawn to them. Wherever my work takes me lately, be it a depiction of a single floating leaf or a tomb filled with mysterious artifacts, the idea of past life and new significance is the overarching theme.

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Ryan S. Brown is an accomplished painter trained in the naturalist traditions of the nineteenth century. He lives and paints in Utah.

Talk about your development as an artist. I didn’t grow up in an artistic environment. No one in my family knew anything about art. But, since I was young, I enjoyed drawing. It was always something fun to do, like playing basketball or swimming. I never thought of it as a potential career until late in high school. When I got to college I signed up for the illustration program because it seemed the most viable option for making money as an artist. I was lucky in this decision because I naturally gravitated towards representational art, and the illustration program was still tied to the traditions I appreciated, whereas the studio art programs in most universities, BYU included, were and are very biased towards post-modern abstraction. However, by the end of my time at BYU I began to realize the severe deficiencies in my education. It was then that I found the Florence Academy of Art in Florence, Italy. It was there that I feel like I first started to understand the potential for art and the depth and breadth of its purpose.

How was your experience at the Florence Academy of Art? The curriculum at the Florence Academy of Art is patterned after the system of education from the schools of 19^th century Paris. This system and its results are proven through the thousands of masters that were produced from it resulting in the creation of some of the greatest works ever conceived by man. This education is made up of the accumulated knowledge passed down from master to apprentice over thousands of years through art history. My time at the Florence Academy of Art was the great turning point in my artistic career. The education served to clear the visual fog left by my university education. The organized, clear approach to education helped develop the foundational knowledge I needed to achieve the quality of work I hoped to. Living in Florence also proved to be one of the most inspiring experiences of my life. The history, culture, architecture, food, and pace of life all combined to create the most fertile ground for my artistic inspiration that I’ve ever experienced. Since then, regular visits to museums around the world have helped clarify and define my artistic vision. Studying the past masters has helped further adopt me into the tradition I so love, and provided me with my greatest education after my time at the Florence Academy. 

What is the Center for Academic Study and Naturalist Painting? The Center for Academic Study and Naturalist Painting is an answer to the need for an organized traditional approach to art education in Utah. At the moment, it is the only school available in Utah that teaches the traditions of drawing and painting with ties to the curriculums of the 18^th and 19^th century Paris schools. The CAS is also one of only 33 schools in the world that is Art Renewal Approved, a status bestowed by the Art Renewal Center and given only to schools that follow traditional teaching and exhibit the quality of faculty and student work that achieves the highest of standards. Our students have won top awards in the Art Renewal Centers student competition, as well as the Alpine Fellowship and the Hudson River Landscape Fellowship.

What are you working on next? My upcoming plans include a one-man show in August 2016 at S. R. Brennen Galleries in Santa Fe. I am also planning on moving my family back to Europe to live for a few years. I feel it necessary to live nearer to great museums to continue to grow as an artist. The inspiration of Europe beckons to me. I also feel like the direction of the CAS is headed toward Paris. We are trying to become more established towards gaining accreditation as a school and I feel like the environment of Paris is more conducive to the educational experience young artists need to gain a more well rounded and personal artistic vision. We are looking for patrons and donors to help make the move to Paris possible. It may take some time, but I am hopeful it will happen soon.

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Denise Gasser is a mixed-media artist with a fascinating collection called Tree Portraiture. She lives in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Describe yourself as an artist. I would say that while I am not always consistent, I am absolutely persistent. My lifestyle and personality don’t always allow for really consistent productivity. Sometimes I will go for weeks without picking up a paintbrush, and sometimes I will paint every single day for months. I will get random bursts of inspiration and stay up all night working. Other times painting sounds like the worst thing in the world and I wish I could just read or watch TV guilt-free; it’s kind of a complicated relationship. I also have a hard time sticking to one subject matter or style. I get inspired by so many different things, so it’s hard to make myself hone in on one thing at a time. So I have been categorizing my work into a few specific series, and I’m forcing myself to at least stick to those for now. Despite the challenges of being an artist, it’s who I am; I wouldn’t be me without it. I decided a long time ago that it’s worth the struggle, so I’m in it for the long haul…sometimes inching along, sometimes sprinting…but I’m in it.

What do you think about art within the Mormon culture? When I think of ‘Mormon art’ my mind immediately recalls soft, glowing images of Christ with flowers and sunsets, or the super-muscular Nephi paintings that accompany the illustrated version of the Book of Mormon. I’m guessing a lot of Mormons would have the same reaction…likely because these are the overtly Mormon images that we all grew up with. Though these works are beautiful and important, I think we are really limiting ourselves if we allow these few images to typify our entire view of Mormon art. Mormons are a creative people with a rich history in art, architecture, music, and dance, emphasizing beauty, quality, and craftsmanship. This tradition is still thriving in the Mormon community today, with artwork that is incredibly expansive and diverse. Just off the top of my head I can think of at least a dozen Mormon artists who are doing amazingly innovative work. I think we just need to expand our definition of ‘Mormon art’ to include ‘art created by Mormons’. Even if the artwork itself isn’t specifically Mormon, there are common threads of belief that bind Mormon artist together, and likely weave their way into everything they create. Allowing for a broader definition of what constitutes Mormon art would hopefully encourage us to take pride in the incredible talent that is harbored within the Mormon culture.

What are you working on next? Right now I’m putting most of my creative energy into two major projects. This is me honing in! After all that talk about simple beauty…I am actually working on a more conceptual series called Art After. It’s been an ongoing project that attempts to harness the tension and ambivalence that exists in my roles as artist and mother. They are just tiny little pieces, 5×7, and I’m hoping to make about 200. I create each piece in one sitting, working without stopping until I am either finished, or until I am interrupted. Usually I end up stopping at the point that I literally can’t continue working through the interruptions. At that point I have to stop working, and I can’t go back and finish. For each piece I am documenting the start time, the end time, and the nature of the interruption that forced me to stop. So some pieces last about two minutes, and others last over two hours. It’s been a really nice way to integrate art and motherhood, and to comment on the extremely challenging aspects of continuing to make art after becoming a mother. The other project I’m working on is a series based on the amazing urban park here in Vancouver BC, called Stanley Park.

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Justin Kunz is a painter and illustrator and is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Visual Arts at BYU. Previously, he worked at Blizzard Entertainment creating concept art, environment textures, and building 3D assets for World of Warcraft. He was a Lead Texture and Concept Artist at Disney Interactive Studios. Kunz was also selected to be a master designer as part of the Artistic Infusion Program with the US Mint and he has had three designs minted.

Describe yourself as an artist. I live in a perpetual state of amazement at the beauty that is practically everywhere I go. I understand not everyone experiences the world this way, so I try to act normal just to blend in. I could blame my college education for burdening me with a mind attuned to this impractical kind of awareness, because that was the time when I felt like I had finally begun to see. But I have memories of the awe induced by visual experiences that predate any formal training. That makes me wonder if part of my sensibilities are the result of something more primal. Maybe I’ve always been this way.

I guess that’s what people probably mean when they say, “You’re so talented.” I once saw a T-shirt that said something like this: HARD WORK IS FOR PEOPLE SHORT ON TALENT. Silly me, I thought, I’ve been working way too hard on my art! It came as a great relief to learn, after more than 20 years of continuous efforts to improve myself as an artist, I can just kick back and relax because, as so many people have assured me, I’m talented!  But in all seriousness, I still find myself working many long, focused hours because I haven’t figured out how to produce high-quality art using talent alone. The component of craft is integral to the way I create, and that is something that takes time.

Your figure paintings are really great–how do you choose your subject matter? Thank you. In the case of commissioned pieces such as the coin and medal designs, concept illustrations, and some of the paintings, the subjects vary depending on the needs and interests of the client. For me the unifying theme seems to be a desire to tell stories visually, in a way that conveys a sense of spiritual resonance. Sometimes those stories are historical, other times fictional; some are scriptural, others fantastical. I have a variety of interests and many more ideas than I have time to develop into finished paintings. So I have to be patient and try to choose the right projects at the right time. I also love to paint landscape, but most of my recent work has involved figures in some way. The style of my work is a function of both the process of its creation and the particular sense I have about the subject—not only what it means, but how my ideas and feelings about it might be expressed through a series of aesthetic choices.

How does your religion shape your artwork? Obviously not all of my artwork is overtly religious in nature. In fact, it has only been the last three years or so that I have really started to paint scriptural themes. I illustrated several articles in Ensign and Liahona during the first five or six years of my career, but most of those were contemporary subjects. The Biblical paintings are a more recent development. For a long time, I was reluctant to try painting pictures of the Savior. Not because I didn’t want to, I just never really felt ready (maybe worthy would be more accurate). I wasn’t always happy with the way other artists portrayed him, but I also questioned my own ability to do justice to these sacred subjects. I still have some of those doubts, but I knew it was something I wanted to do eventually, and putting it off didn’t feel right either. So when Dallan Wright from Deseret Book came to my studio and challenged me to try painting a New Testament theme, I took him up on it. That piece, On Earth as it is in Heaven, which is a portrayal of the Lord’s Prayer during the Sermon on the Mount, has been included in several exhibitions including a few national competitions. The artists I admire most have found a way to express some aspect of their faith in almost everything they create, whether that expression is direct or indirect in nature. It’s that kind of artist I aspire to be.

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Boyd K. Packer passed away earlier this month and was a lifelong artist and artisan. An article on LDS.org said of Packer, “Ever since his childhood in the farming community of Brigham City, Utah, President Boyd K. Packer has had a love of nature and art. Of particular interest to him have been birds and animals. In high school, he had ambitions to become an artist, but World War II led him in another direction.”

See more at President Boyd K. Packer: Apostle and Artist.