Proper nowadays artists: day 1 - Paul John Reid

Early last year at a workshop (when they were still going on) I was talking about Ribera’s and Meissonier’s paintings and I was asked what living artists I like that are good as well. So here’s an artist for every day of this year who I like and who I think show good understanding of design and drawing, light and dark, colour, space and composition - all the good stuff that I talk about in workshops.

Some qualifiers - they have to be artists that show these academic qualities. Artists who I love like Chris Ware, Franco Matticchio, Peter Bagge, Gary Dumm, Art Spiegelman , John Kenn Mortensen, Billy Childish, Dave Brown, etc. won’t get included. Their work doesn’t show some or all of the qualities I’m talking about.

Also they have to be artists whose work I like. There are lots of artists whose work is excellent in terms of what I’m talking about in teaching workshops, but I don’t care for the style or the subject for some reason.

And obviously they have to be living. I would like to have been able to include Mort Drucker, Daniel Greene, Namio Harukawa, Bernard Dunstan, Alessandro Biffignandi, Timo Ketola, Toshio Saeki, Richard Corben, Nelson Shanks, Ted Seth Jacobs and others who’ve unfortunately died recently.

So, in no particular order, here’s today’s..

Scottish artist, Paul John Reid. He paints mythological subjects among other things, like this one.

Minotaur, 2005