I was born in Burlington, Vermont in 1962 and was adopted by Hildred and Allan Hall of Stanford, Connecticut.
At the time, my father was Vice President of advertising at Madison Square Garden and NBC, and my mother
was a homemaker until their divorce in 1966. I was raised in a household that was surrounded by art. My aunt
was an opera singer, my godfather was an art teacher in Summit, New Jersey, my mother loved to sing, and my
grandmother ran a rooming house in Keene, New Hampshire, where many famous entertainers stayed, such as
Lucille Ball. A famous landscape artist also stayed at the house. Her name was Helena Putnam. She had an art store
in downtown Keene, and she gave private art lessons on Saturdays. My mother encouraged me to take art lessons
with Helena every Saturday morning. I would stand in her store, waiting for my lesson to begin and gaze at all of the
art supplies. I loved the smell of the oil paints and the turpentine. There was a window in the back of the shop that
overlooked the backstreets of Keene, and it reminded me of The West Side Story.
Times became financially strained for my mother. I remember seeing a book on Leonardo Da Vinci entitled
Unknown Leonardo at a downtown bookstore. I wanted that book badly, but it was very expensive for my mother
at the time. Credit cards didn’t exist in those days. Somehow my mother scraped together the money to buy that
book for me and gave it to me for Christmas. I drew from that book for hours on end. I loved Da Vinci’s work, and
I fell in love with all of the Renaissance artists. I wanted to learn how to paint like that. In art school, I was encouraged
to come up with a new style. The instructors wanted me to paint like Matisse, Miro, and Klee. They wanted me to express
myself, but I wanted to learn and understand how to paint like the Renaissance artists. I wanted to learn the use of
symbolism in their paintings, the use of the golden section, and understand how to paint the figure. My goal was always to
learn how to combine the figure, the still life, and the landscape all together in one painting. Although there were good
instructors at the University, I didn’t really learn how to paint until I studied under James Aponovich. He was able to teach
me all about the Renaissance, including the golden section and all of the painting techniques that I had been starving to learn.
I begin each of my oil paintings with basic geometric shapes using the elements of design (line, shape, form, texture, color,
and scale) and fill them in with every day objects. I paint on either linen or masonite board. I use many layers of paint in order
to achieve the color that I desire. Each painting is then glazed to bring out a final element of color. I enhance the beauty of the
objects that I see. I paint objects from the inside out. The paintings that I create reflect the personal aspects of my life.
The flowers are from my wife’s gardens, the antiques are from my own collection, and my landscapes are taken from my travels
around the world.
Use of light has always been very important to me. Since viewing the works of Andrew Wyeth, Vermeer, and Van Eyck, I have tried
to bring elements of light into each of my paintings. Ultimately what I am trying to achieve with my paintings is a vision of the
perfect setting.