Painter Joey Howell had over 40 years experience writing and performing music before he ever even tried to paint. During his music career he has played guitar and percussion in numerous bands and as a soloist. His discography includes his critically acclaimed 1997 cd Moondog, a collection of solo acoustic guitar compositions. A native of eastern North Carolina and graduate of Duke University, Howell moved to the deep woods of Chatham County, North Carolina in 1987. He took up drawing for the first time in 2000, branching out to painting a few years later. Since being selected in 2006, Joey has been an active member of the Chatham Artists Guild and its Open Studio Tour. He has exhibited in many juried shows and venues, including the ArtsCenter, Carrboro, NC, and the Emerge Gallery Schwa Show, Greenville, NC, and his work is in private collections from Boston to Arizona and throughout North Carolina.

ARTIST'S STATEMENT

My paintings combine intense spectral color and a loose, fluid style. Objects in the cosmos are an important source for subject material. I love astronomy and cosmology, and I am inspired by images from the NASA/JPL Hubble, Spitzer and GALEX Space Telescopes. But rather than copy the galaxies and nebulae in a photorealistic way, I prefer to introduce some level of abstraction and intensification into the work, to enhance the sense of space and create a feeling of aliveness. I want to convey my belief that these objects are the living, evolving organisms of our universe.

I also enjoy using the human body and animals as subjects to explore the use of color alone, as opposed to tone, to create form. Central to my approach to color painting is the application of “color scales”, which are analogous to musical scales, to establish the pallet and heighten the mood of a painting, and to create the sense of depth. Clear, straightforward composition and naturalistic drawing within an abstract context put the focus on the subtle shades of expression of body language and especially the face and eyes of both people and animals.

Click here to download my portfolio (5.4Mb PDF).

Click here to download "Painting With Color Scales" (47kb PDF).

Member:
Chatham Artists Guild