Lance Rudegeair

I have been working with wildlife as my subject matter for about 12

years. I started it full time when I left my teaching job at the

University of Dayton. As a free-lance illustrator with my wife, Jean, as the

Creative Director at Antioch Publishing, I was offered a wildlife

bookmark project. I enjoyed this project so much more than the illustration I

had been doing, so I decided to devote all my time to wildlife -

specifically exotic and/or endangered animals. I wanted this new direction to

have more validity than simply the rendering of an image for the

purpose of illustrating a story or decorating a product.

In my work I try to maintain focus on the animal itself. The animal is

the star - its beauty and its aesthetic is what I try to convey to the

viewer. Realism with some stylization is important, but I am not going

for photo realism. Having done and still sometimes doing abstract art,

my concern with paint and my medium still apply. I want the viewer to

see and appreciate the painted stroke much as one would an impressionist

painting. The realism comes from a compilation of visual clues. In most

of my wildlife paintings I use light sources to try to push the

aesthetic of the animal's texture - their fur or feathers, etc.