Darryl Pottorf
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As an artist my complexity is traveling the world.  I approach them like a potential canvas relating to the culture of the adventured, leading to the lessons of “Chiaroscuro”.  Light and dark go beyond color but are essential in the composition and drawing the viewers’ eye around the painting with getting caught in the aspect of the piece.

I had a great love of architecture and interest in books on ancient art; Egyptian and the 18th, 19th centuries, Etruscan art, sculpture as well as Greek and the Italian Renaissance.

I lived, worked and studied in Florence for weeks, months, years, Florence became my home and was a grand influence on me personally and as an artist.  In 1976 I became Dr. Licht’s research assistant for his book on Goya: The influence of modern temper on art.  Goya was recognized as the bridge between Romanticism and Modernism.  I was also an artist for archeological digs, documenting objects that had been buried and lost for centuries.  I had immense love and respect for the everyday objects, paintings or sculptures of antiquities use of composition, color, nuance and subtleties.  Because of my experience with art history and the world my art grew through preparation, composition and color.  The beauty and simplicity of the Etruscans, the extravagance of the Greeks and Romans, moving from the tight compositions into the exaggeration of natural proportions gave the work more emotion and expression.

I have also been informed by architecture and the sense of proportion and detail found throughout history, symmetry and asymmetry brought into balance, exaggeration would be brought into perspective by introducing symmetry to direct the eye of the viewer.  When I design a building, theatrical setting or create a painting I try to bring around the painting or through the space.    In the theater I learned the boldness of scale and developed the love of creating art that would reflect the 3 dimensional world.

All led to my first exhibition in 1982.  As a young artist I recall I approached the work diligently and deliberately to reflect my own artistic sensibility.  The gift of collaboration I have learned is that an artist has the freedom to do anything the mind can conceive, limited only by technology, personal skills……and fears.  I begin painting with a rough idea, concept, which, usually I look for the feature image that everything will work with, around to create a now whole.  Technology in this day is impossible to work and ignore the possibilities.

To me making art is a true collaboration with life, environment and those who surround the artist.  Having traveled the world and photographed the four corners of this world I have experienced great beauty and the reality of different cultures.   Although, I keep an image bank that goes back to my youth. 

I am happiest working in my studio and continuing to explore the possibilities the world offers and the questions it brings to mind.  I believe art is unique to the viewers responsibility.  Respondent to my own curiosity I process and negotiate with my materials and the world that surrounds me.  Art and life are inseparable.

-Darryl