After The Flood: Life in Taos for Artist Gary Paul
Listening to Gary Paul, a contemporary American artist and printmaker’s life story was like trying to digest a box of trail mix. He’s traveled around the world three times.
Growing up in Indianapolis, at sixteen Paul’s uncle sat him down and told him, “Son, you have no future in this town.” It was during the Cuban Missile Crisis when John F. Kennedy was president. After high school Paul asked for his father’s consent to join the US Air Force in 1962.
One year later he was able to join the K-9 division until 1966.
In 1972 Paul graduated from the California College of Arts and Crafts, in Oakland, California with a bachelors of fine art degree. His interests were in all forms of printmaking, oil painting and mixed media. He has independently studied all over the world, including Australia,
Bali, Belize, Fiji, Florence, Italy; India, Jamaica, China, Peru, at the Cite
Internationale de Paris,
France; in French Polynesia, and Yucatan, as well as Tibet and more places than can be listed.
In the early 1980s Paul produced a silk screen series. After suffering an ailment in New Delhi, India a local doctor hand wrote a prescription for an antimalarial drug. The result for Paul was an hallucinogenic experience he had while working on the first print in the series, called “New Delhi Morning.” The drug-induced side effects resulted in some of his most colorful, energetic works, which he continued to produce when he returned to Denver, Colorado.
While a student aide at Santa Barbara City College, Paul escorted students to Paris in 1992 and 1993, and for the next 12 years he visited Paris annually. He frequently painted at The Louvre where he was allowed to select a painting to copy. While in Paris he also visited the studio of avant-garde photographer Man Ray. At Ray’s studio Paul created an abstract mixed media montage titled, “31 bis.rue Champagne-Premiere.”
Paul moved to Taos permanently in 2018 after many productive years in Denver, Colorado. He unpacked his house, set up his studio and contemplated how he’d make a living in Taos. He decided to pull out his prints from the 1980s which were all meticulously preserved and signed. He’d used the most expensive handmade embossed paper from Italy. He spread them on the studio floor and organized his work to frame, mat and shrink wrap.
The next morning he walked into his studio to discover a river pouring
from under the doors.
The hot water heater had burst in the night, destroying the majority of his prints. Shocked and dismayed, Paul recovered only the cost of the paper from the insurance policy he had held for forty years, before being dropped.
The loss of possessions or finances is all too familiar to those that choose to make Taos home.
It seems to require a stripping down of ego and identity and a reevaluation of what is important.
Today, Paul is happily painting in his studio with fresh awareness. The panoramic views of
Taos mountain inspire him with new personal freedom. Maggie, his cat, sleeps on a sunny perch, depicted in Paul’s most recent 48”x 48” oil painting, “Maggie’s Loft.”
Paul is represented at the Taos Artist Collective at 106 A Paseo del Norte. His website is TheCanvasandEye.com. Paul’s work has been exhibited in regional and national exhibitions and is included in many private and public collections in the US and Europe.
Taos Artist Collective
106 A Paseo del pueblo Norte 303-514-5151 thecanvasandeye.com