Richard's profile
I was born in 1957 in the Garden State of New Jersey (Exit 14a for you locals).
As long as I can remember I have been interested in Ancient Egypt, but I do not know why. I can point to my first coherent memory of something Egyptian. I can even attach a date to it now thanks to the www. It first aired on TV October 2, 1964--a Jonny Quest cartoon, The Curse of Anubis. What an adventure! I was 6 years old and the cobras, scorpions, and walking mummies nearly scared me to death. I was hooked.
My first memory as a painter was also at a very young age. We had an oak tree in our yard that supplied me with acorns. I began to paint them and thought the different colored, painted acorns were absolutely beautiful. I created quite a production line to paint acorns, which I planned on selling to the entire neighborhood. This was my first experience with the idea of "beauty being in the eye of the beholder". It also laid the foundation of an otherwise unremarkable sales career, as I didn't sell any acorns--not one. Time marched on, as a teen I relieved boredom by copying album covers. My favorites were Grateful Dead covers. One in particular, Aoxomoxoa, has a subtle Egyptian influence including a winged solar disk and a scarab. I am also reminded of a Grateful Dead bumper sticker that I saw every day on my brother's car... "In the land of the night the ship of the sun is drawn by the grateful dead." This is reminiscent of the Egyptian Book of Gates, an ancient text that explains the route that the sun god Ra's boat takes through the underworld. Because there was no wind in the underworld his ship is pulled by the grateful dead.
My formal training is limited to two years at a Carroll County Tech Center where I studied Drafting. After a year or so in the working world of Civil Engineering I went back to school at the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA), in Baltimore, MD. In my first year at MICA, I was once again introduced to ancient Egypt. I bought my first copy of the Book of the Dead for a poetry class. I was fascinated by the hieroglyphic language and the fact that this ancient picture writing was now a modern type face. My first Egyptian drawing of this period was for an art history class. It was a copy of a small artifact from The Walters Art Museum. I majored in sculpture and was thrilled to find myself pouring hot metal in MICA's sculpture foundry. The result of a lost wax casting assignment is called Tut's Tour, still one of my favorite pieces. Ever since, I've been completely immersed in the Ancient Egyptian style of art.
As long as I can remember I have been interested in Ancient Egypt, but I do not know why. I can point to my first coherent memory of something Egyptian. I can even attach a date to it now thanks to the www. It first aired on TV October 2, 1964--a Jonny Quest cartoon, The Curse of Anubis. What an adventure! I was 6 years old and the cobras, scorpions, and walking mummies nearly scared me to death. I was hooked.
My first memory as a painter was also at a very young age. We had an oak tree in our yard that supplied me with acorns. I began to paint them and thought the different colored, painted acorns were absolutely beautiful. I created quite a production line to paint acorns, which I planned on selling to the entire neighborhood. This was my first experience with the idea of "beauty being in the eye of the beholder". It also laid the foundation of an otherwise unremarkable sales career, as I didn't sell any acorns--not one. Time marched on, as a teen I relieved boredom by copying album covers. My favorites were Grateful Dead covers. One in particular, Aoxomoxoa, has a subtle Egyptian influence including a winged solar disk and a scarab. I am also reminded of a Grateful Dead bumper sticker that I saw every day on my brother's car... "In the land of the night the ship of the sun is drawn by the grateful dead." This is reminiscent of the Egyptian Book of Gates, an ancient text that explains the route that the sun god Ra's boat takes through the underworld. Because there was no wind in the underworld his ship is pulled by the grateful dead.
My formal training is limited to two years at a Carroll County Tech Center where I studied Drafting. After a year or so in the working world of Civil Engineering I went back to school at the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA), in Baltimore, MD. In my first year at MICA, I was once again introduced to ancient Egypt. I bought my first copy of the Book of the Dead for a poetry class. I was fascinated by the hieroglyphic language and the fact that this ancient picture writing was now a modern type face. My first Egyptian drawing of this period was for an art history class. It was a copy of a small artifact from The Walters Art Museum. I majored in sculpture and was thrilled to find myself pouring hot metal in MICA's sculpture foundry. The result of a lost wax casting assignment is called Tut's Tour, still one of my favorite pieces. Ever since, I've been completely immersed in the Ancient Egyptian style of art.
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