Tom Colcord

MILLENNIAL IMPRESSIONIST PAINTER

Tom Colcord (b. 1990) is a painter and educator based in San Francisco, CA, originally from Indianapolis, IN. Tom received a Master of Fine Art degree in studio art from the San Francisco Art Institute, CA and a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in painting from Indiana University Bloomington, IN. He has served as the Bay Area Representative for Strathmore Artist Papers and Gamblin Artist’s Colors and was an arts educator for the SFAI City Studio Program in San Francisco, CA and Drawn2Art in Los Altos, CA. Most recently he completed the Wabash International Artist Residency in Wabash County, IN.

PIXELATED PAINTING PROCESS

"Pixelated images spark feelings of nostalgia for me. As a child of the 90s' and early 2000’s, video games and tiny television screens helped shape my reality. These "Pixel Paintings" are essentially Millennial Impressionism, as I am using a personal lens specific to myself to create an abstraction of reality. To recreate these feelings, I take photos from moments of everyday life that beguile me and bring them into Photoshop where I pixelate them and play with the color and mood. I then painstakingly stencil and paint them in acrylic to be as true to the digital version as possible. This process feels similar to 'the grind' gamers refer to when they are performing repetitive tasks in a role playing video game. Much like being engrossed in the alternate reality of a video game, this painting process is absorbing, repetitive, and challenging. This process results in an image that is several layers removed from its impetus, yet retains a certain undefined quality that makes it feel magical." —Tom Colcord