The Artful Life Of John Palombo: A Path Of Mysticism, Torture, & A Little Debauchery
With just enough challenge growing up to gain some deep colors and spectrum in his life, he has made use of the follies and torture of being human and turned them into joy and happiness by finding something that truly spoke to his soul – visiting remote natural areas and painting.
At age six he moved from his birth-land of Louisiana to his German grandparent’s cabin home in the woods of Indiana. It was as though his grandmother’s art and his grandfather’s love of being in the woods was where the magic seeped through the cracks. Sally Kriner, was a fine artist of lovely flower arrangements in the medium of oil painting. Her studio was placed on the backside of the home with large windows that overlooked the endless rolling hills of deciduous forests where he played.
He was always creative and searching for outlets from a young age on into adulthood – poetry, drawing, pottery, photography, music, gardening, web design, graphic design, animation, paper arts, carpentry, psychedelics…
At age 37, he started a small handyman company that grew to be very successful, and yet, he was ultimately unhappy and felt starved for the magic that made life worth living. It was the simplistic art of noticing, and through the attentive presence with the life he saw around him, that inspired him to depict the richness of color that life emits. He attempted to capture colors and turning them into shapes… first it was water colors, then he was encouraged to take up acrylics.
The focus of his art has been landscapes of Southern Oregon, and particularly Southeastern Oregon. He initially began with impressionistic shapes and landscapes and found himself a bit lost. He then began to use his photos of SE Oregon as inspiration and found an exquisite ability to produce near realism, which he would then blend some impressionistic aspects into, adding a touch of the magic that he experiences in these places. He is currently on display at ART on FIRST.
