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(American, b. 1969)
Charley Snow currently lives in Helper, Utah—a small coal-mining town about 100 miles south of Salt Lake City. He earned his BFA from the University of Utah in 1998. Since graduation he has served, as David Dornan’s assistant in addition to painting full time. Charley has paintings in private collections from Massachusetts to California.
What I like most about painting is the act of interpreting nature. Looking at the landscape and translating what I see into marks on a canvas. When I layer splashes, drips, and strokes of paint to create an image, painting takes on a double life. Both the image and the marks are interesting. That is essentially what painting is about for me—both the abstract and real existing in the same painting.
I learned to paint by working with the figure. When I graduated I had trouble finding models to work with so I started painting cows. They work cheap and they’re almost always available. I soon discovered that every cow had its own personality and gesture. Now I see painting cows like painting portraits. Rather than using cows as icons I try to convey my sense of each particular cow. That kind of focus is the same when I paint houses in the landscape as well. I am struck by the possibility of each house to contain a thousand stories. They take on the appearance of a unique history and I try to capture that feeling.