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K E N A U S T E R
Please click on the link below to view a video of Ken Auster in Carmel
Ken Auster visits New Masters Gallery in Carmel.
Narrow Gauge
6" x 24"
Narrow Escape
6" x 24"
Electric Company
Is this a baseball cut?
48" x 44"
24" x 30"
Refueling
Toes to the Nose
Rock Dance
11" x 11"
11" x 11"
11" x 11"
Petal to the Metal
A Question of Balance
11" x 11"
9" x 12"
Cutback
6" x 18"
All Congested
6" x 18"
Direct Cable
6" x 18"
Yellow Fever
Lighten Up
12" x 16"
12" x 16"
My Fare Ladies
Busy Bodies
12" x 16"
12" x 16"
No Left Turn Red
Light District
40" x 40" 25"
x 32"
Sun in My Eyes
Islands in the Steet
48" x 48"
34" x 48"
Church Light
Discovering Columbus
48" x 48"
52" x 48"
Wheee.....
Night Light
28" x 35"
36" x 48"
Standing Room Only
Mr. Drake I Presume
6" x 8"
6" x 8"
Read
it and Weep
I'll Get it
9" x 12"
9" x 12"
Coit Quilt Bad
Hair Day
9" x 12" 9"
x 12"
SOLD
San Francisco Treat Miller
Time
84"
x 60"
24" x 30"
Wired
Bird Feeder
9" x 12"
9" x 12"
The Guardian The
Red Light District Land's
End
34"
x 20" 34"
x 20" 34"
x 20"
Direct
Cable
Down From Chinatown
12"
x 16"
9" x 12"
Safe
Harbor Got
Water
12" x 16" 16"
x 12"
It's Not My Job
Union Study
40" x 40"
24" x 30"
Biography
"For it was in his formative years in Long Beach, California, where Ken grew up with his feet deeply planted in the surfing culture, that he first learned to express his art talent. Caught up in the ground swell of the 1960s surfing culture, Ken not only plunged into the sport of surfing but into the art and graphics of surfing as well.
While working his way
towards a Bachelor in Fine Arts degree from Long Beach State University, Ken
built one of the world's most prominent silkscreen and T-shirt companies,
creating now-legendary surfing art that adorned surfers from Belmont Shores to
Hawaii to Mexico. His surfing images, silk-screened as original prints on paper,
became the "fine art" of this beach culture, and today, represent the classic
surf art of the past century.
At the heart of Ken's work was always the awareness of the fine line between
man-made and nature. In the mid-1990s, Ken moved to a more serious art level -
involving him with the immediacy of oil paints as opposed to the
process-burdened medium of printmaking. Throwing himself into the splendor of "plein
air" (on location) painting, Ken discovered the richness and broad colors of the
city life he long avoided. As he will tell you, he rejoiced in this newfound
ability to paint anything and everything - cafes, train stations, airports,
street scenes, and of course, never far away, was the beach, his first love.
The transition from surf
art to serious impressionism was natural for Ken - his passion and obsession to
reach a new understanding between himself and the oil painting medium took on a
new intensity of discovery. "I simply want to achieve the ultimate communication
on the canvas - to say more with less," Ken says.
His deft use of color. His economies of brush strokes. His simple, yet
beautifully structured compositions. As one famous critic described - "each
painting captures a moment in time charged with a hint of narrative drama. And
each is rendered with such vibrant immediacy that a single glance excites other
senses as well."
Ken's passion for painting is shared with hundreds of students who each year
travel from around the world to attend his workshops in Laguna Beach and Carmel.
With his life partner, Paulette Martinson, they have a thriving art world
centered at their studio and gallery in picturesque Laguna Canyon.
In a relatively short time
since this transition to plein air painting, Ken Auster has moved to the
forefront of American contemporary impressionists. He consistently walks away
with gold medals and first place awards at juried exhibits. His work is
collected by some of the most respected galleries and patrons.
Renowned for his classic surf art, Ken Auster now sees and paints a bold,
dynamically changing world, whether it is London, Venice (Italy), San Francisco,
Carmel, Napa Valley, or Baja, Mexico. He shares with us the uncomplicated but
moving stories on canvas - simply and effectively, documenting the ordinary in
an unordinary manner.
And what about his surfing? Well, if the surf is flat, you'll find Ken in his
studio. But when the surf is "up", you'll find Ken, most likely, filling his
other passion."
Biography supplied by the artist.
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urban landscape figurative modern cityscapes