Tom Buzbee
Explorations
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Florida artist.
Tom Buzbee Artist
In place of a dry resume I decided to write a short history. I have worked in Disney as an artist, NASA as an Illustrator, and taught, both as an adjunct and full-time, for 20+ years. At the moment I am privileged to be the full-time Artist in Residence at Full Sail Real World Education in Winter Park, FL.
It allows me to pursue my artistic passion and share it with a community around me. I am able to work closely on an individual basis with students. I am able to use my Art as a tool to teach. I have found that students respond very well as they watch someone practicing the craft they are interested in learning.
I hope I am representing the many textures and colors of the life I have lived. My father was a US diplomat so we experienced many different cultures, languages, climates, landscapes, etc. I believe this to be, above all, the reason I create Art. I tell my students to look at as much of the world as possible and you will become aware. Expand all your horizons, including but not limited to, your visual horizons.
These paintings are explorations in a synthesis between two worlds I have sought to bring together. The spontaneous expression oriented approach and the more controlled representational approach. I have always felt the pull in two directions. Maybe a pull between my heart and my head.
I usually start with acrylics, use plant-squirters, brooms, palette knives, etc. to get a “ground” that I feel is free and heart-felt. Often it is wild and untamed. I love the moment when you depend on your dance as you move and stop thinking, just work. Trust your subconscious. After I am satisfied with the ground, I feel the need to tame it with the objects I place on it. The objects are, for the most part, invented. They are purely vehicles to make pleasing arrangements of shape, color, and texture. I have called them “fantasy still-lifes” and given them nonsensical names that shouldn’t steer the viewer away from the fact that I don’t care to make any statement other than an aesthetic one.
