James Nyika

Morning Service, Original Painting

2022

Artist Comments
Artist James Nyika plays with light and shadow in this impression of St. Mary's Church in Upper Marlboro, Maryland. The sunrise orientation delivers a strong pattern to the church and its surrounding buildings. He envisions the parishioners visiting and being greeted by the priest by the bright brick tower that houses the tolling church bells. James achieves a magical transparent glow in his watercolor pieces.

About the Artist
Artist James Nyika paints the glowing atmosphere of cities across the world. As a child growing up in Kenya, he found art materials at the student bookshop and also borrowed just about every art history volume from the British Council library in Nairobi. "I checked out the same books over and over just to stare at the art, to try and understand how it was created," says James. With family encouragement to study engineering, James moved to the U.S. and immersed himself in science studies at Boston University. Several years after embarking on a tech career, he set a goal to create at least one painting a week, never throwing away any works and learning as much as possible in his off hours. Today, James still balances his full-time career designing large software systems with his prolific output as a painter. "Painting is a great antidote to the regularity of a computing profession and I really value it for the uncertainty that it brings - something frowned upon when writing code."

Words that describe this painting: church, tower, facade, Upper Marlboro, Maryland, St. Mary's, parish, architecture, sunrise, sunlight, shadow, impressionism, paper, watercolor, travel, architecture, impressionism, travel, watercolor painting, brown

Morning Service
James Nyika
Watercolor painting on paper
Ready to frame
One-of-a-kind
Signed on front
2022
15 in. h x 22 in. w
0 lbs. 1 oz.