Paul Gleason - Oil Landscape

Paul Gleason ~ Artist Statement

Born and raised in Oregon, Paul completed university degrees in Washington and California, including a Master of Fine Arts in painting at Stanford University. Following a career in Japanese and American technology companies, he retired to Depoe Bay several years ago to pursue his passion – landscape painting.

Of his work, Paul says, "The first inspiration I had to make paintings came from observing the beauty of nature while in high school. Also, I found a dusty, old book during that time on Camille Corot, the greatest landscape painter of the 19th Century, whose work moved me. In college, I was taught modernism and made abstract art because it was what was considered acceptable. Within a few years, I found abstract art unsatisfying.

When I returned to painting several years ago, I was again inspired by Corot and some of his contemporaries. I went to the Louvre and the Prado to study their paintings. The best outdoor work of these pre-impressionist painters was the result of honest, careful observation, unencumbered by academic self-consciousness. Today, they feel like windows in time to real places humanly observed and felt.

The delicate colors and atmosphere of the Oregon Coast are highly variable, subtle and difficult to paint in a naturalistic way. I paint using a disciplined method that gives primacy to the subject as I experience it in real time, without fluff and trendy period stylizations.