I’m now a sixty-nine year old native of Colorado Springs and I am still deciding what to do with my life. My art career started when I was a mere three years old. My mom repainted my bedroom for me. It was a beautiful white color. I was inspired by this blank page. My medium of choice at that time was crayons with the emphasis on bright colors. My inspiration seems to have come from a Jackson Pollock painting. The work was exquisite, filled with multiple colors and many varied and abstract shapes. My mother laughed for a week. She repainted the walls. I spent months regretting the loss of my first masterpiece.
The startling beauty of this state is why I am an artist. I remember the crisp air when you are having a cup of coffee in the high mountains. Aspen, Telluride, Vail, Longs Peak, and Pikes Peak are all terrific to look at. I have watched wild horses run. I want to capture all that in paintings, with the emphasis on colorful and Colorado.
I have been a digital artist since 1997. I could finally get the control over color. Went to classes in high school, and later I went to Taos, New Mexico to study Southwestern style art and watercolor classes. The computer crashed a lot. I studied more. After years of work, I got it mostly right. I hope you enjoy my art. I hope it reminds you how beautiful the mountains are. I hope it reminds you what a great place Colorado is.
I am a self taught digital artist. I use Corel Painter most of the time, and Photoshop a little bit. When you use digital art, you can control the colors and the paint strokes. You don’t have to clean your brushes. I was hooked.
I have sold paintings for almost two decades. I sold at The Great Indoors at both the Park Meadows Mall and at the Flatirons for five years. I was their number one Colorado artist, and averaged selling three to five paintings a week. I have paintings hanging in the Broadmoor Hotel, at the United States Air Force Academy, and numerous private homes.
I won first place in the digital painting category at the Colorado State Fair several years ago. There were 10,000 entries that year. I also won the People’s Choice Award for the same painting in the same year. The State Fair people told me I got 5 times as many votes for People’s Choice as the second place finisher. I entered a Vail Colorado Art Festival, and finished in the top five sellers with over 130 artists participating.
The Colorado Division of Wildlife used my trout paintings in one of their monthly magazines. I’ve been married for forty five years and I have two grown children. I am slowly recovering from the brain damage teenagers’ cause. It’s been a wonderful life and I am doing well.
Best Regards,
Gregory Kelley
DBA GregorPaintings.com
Gregory Kelley’s work is now on display at Academy Art & Frame Company and will be displayed throughout the months of June and July. Come and meet Greg on Saturday, June 18th from 11am-4pm at the June Extravaganza! You can also check out his work on his website at www.gregorpaintings.com. For more information contact Academy Art & Frame Company at 719-265-6694!