Adam de Boer

Region: Pacific Coast

Website: http://www.adamdeboer.com

City / State: Redlands, CA

I strive to make art that avoids overstated irony or sterility. Although I create tributes to my experiences in modern life I find innate similarities between people regardless of their culture or the era in which they live. I want viewers to feel fulfilled by the genuine sentiment I put into my work and draw connections to their lives by noticing visual cues and details in the paintings that remind them of their own experiences.

My focus as an artist has been large-scale figurative paintings. Early on, I formed a deep interest in narrative work and looked to European painting history for guidance in form and technique. These influences shaped the way I paint and prompted me to chronicle events in my life in ways I find beautiful. Most of my work is about group experiences, patterns in human life, and rituals in modern living. My Catholic upbringing also plays a role in my work, and recent Christian themes—the result of a sojourn in Latin America—now serve to connect my narratives to the European tradition, in content as and form.