Artist Gallery

Stephen Poling

The natural beauty of the world continuously inspires me and fills me with reverence and awe; to be alive on this earth is an incredible thing!

This group of seascapes, made within the past year, is based on my observations and feelings while being at the ocean. Sometimes my process is to create a plein-air painting or a drawing which I then bring back to my studio to use as a reference for the finished piece. At other times I simply observe the scene [and my feelings] and rely exclusively on my memory of the experience for the finished piece. I will look carefully with “hard eyes” at the relationships between the various elements. This is a more technical practice where I analyze values, shapes, colors, etc. I will also look at the scene with “soft eyes” to observe the totality and feel the mood of the scene. As I work on these paintings in the studio these observations and feelings are filtered through my memory. This process makes memory another important element of the painting.

With these paintings I hope to bring a moment of beauty and stillness into the viewer‘s life.

Stephen Poling received a classical art training beginning at the Academy Of Art in San Francisco in the early 70‘s and then continued on at the Art Students League in NYC.