Fine Art and Illustration

The Reason I Moved to Florida

Even though I grew up in Pennsylvania and attended college at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh, the frigid winters eventually got the best of me. Another obvious indicator was that I started whipping out large oil canvas paintings with a common motif: tropical flora and aquatic marine life. In 1991, I packed my car with art supplies and necessities and headed south. I've been in Orlando ever since and have no regrets.

Once I settled in the sunshine state, I decided to paint all of my favorite subjects and take them on the road touring the country's hottest outdoor art festival circuit. I showed my colorful and inspiring oils (some as large as five feet wide) at art festivals all over central Florida and have some pretty hilarious stories of those escapades (later, when we have more time).

Many paintings sold, some won awards, some garnered commissioned work and some even ended up in the Clearwater Marine Science Center. This isn't the highest quality method for displaying fine art, but it's a representation and you'll get the idea. Now? I don't paint much anymore; I find that time has migrated more to writing, which is my latest passion. The good news is that my paintings are still out there bringing enjoyment to their owners and the viewing public.

Oil painting mashup

Pappycards

Not three years out of art school I started my first business: Pappycards. I wrote, designed and produced more than 300 greeting cards and related stationery items. I had a country series called "Country Endearments," an inspirational series with pencil illustrations called "Lifters," "Spot and Spike" baby dinosaur characters, "Teacup Tillie" (who I swear Hallmark got their Maxine idea from) and the best-selling series, "Highlighters." I recall one store owner telling me, "Terry, I had a customer looking for a unique condolence card and when they found one of your Highlighters, they exclaimed it was perfect and they were very appreciative." I loved that feedback, and I got it often.

Several cards with colored pencil and ink illustrations (one is pictured at right) won an honorable mention from the Western Pennsylvania Printing Industry print awards back in mumble mumble (oh, it was a while ago). I hit my stride with "Highlighters" and was moving to the next level of obtaining outside reps, as I'd saturated the Pittburgh market with my own sales. It was about then that Hallmark decided there were too many independent lines stealing valuable sales within their retail stores. That was why the "Gold Crown" concept was created. The retail giant offered 75% off all fixtures and signage to their retailers if they only sold Hallmark products and kicked out all of the independents. I lost more than half of my retail outlets, and ultimately closed Pappycards. Sigh. But it was a fun run, and some of my earliest writing efforts were explored in the simple executions of these fun greeting cards.

Pappycards mashup

Street Painting, Orlando Style

In 1999 I did my first—and likely last—street painting for the annual Rotary Orlando Street Painting Festival. It was in front of City Hall in downtown Orlando, and the Rotary graciously gave me two sidewalk slabs to cover. In three hours I whipped out a big yellow lab, pink tongue flapping, visible from the 14th floor of the CNL tower. It was enough to garner the "Best Newcomer" award from the Rotary.

I gotta tell ya, kneeling on cement for three hours—heck for ONE hour—sucks. And I was one of the first artists to complete their drawing, so I can only imagine how some of them felt after spending eight, nine, ten hours bent over hard cement. I have to say I did enjoy the new experience, and the best part was watching the kids go by and point, "Doggieeeeee!!!"

Street painting mashup

Cows for Charity

Ah, what an artist will do for charity. Or their company. I worked at CNL, a real estate financial trust (REIT) company, and they asked me one year, "Hey, Terry, we've sponsored a cow in the upcoming cow painting festival for charity, and was hoping you'd paint it." Well, how can you turn down an invitation like that. At the time I was into painting aquatic scenes with dolphins, palm trees and lots of blue water. So I decided to paint a similar scene on the circumference of this life-size fiberglass bovine.

One side had a couple of sheepshead, redfish, snapper and the other side had Atlantic bottlenose dolphins. The seascape was topped with beautiful fluffy seen-only-in-Florida clouds. I aptly titled the work "sea cow" (get it, a play on manatees? Yuk yuk) and the folks at CNL were so impressed, they mounted the freakin' finished product on the lip of their third floor balcony for the entire city of Orlando to gawk at. That's me posing next to "Big Jim" (my personal nickname for the bull) as he was secured with sandbags and rope. Now that's something you don't see every day. Oh yeah, and I made it onto the news. (Flashbacks to art school when Dennis Miller [yes, THEE Dennis Miller] worked for a local Pittburgh p.m. news/entertainment show and interviewed me with my "Bean Bag Boss," a little toy I made in art school for office types to take out their frustrations. Dennis just loved my Bean Bag Boss and did a whole bit around it. Oh, where I've been...)

Painted cow mashup