David C Gallup

"Thrill Seekers" (Swimming with Humans)

2018

David C. Gallup has devoted his life to the study, teaching, and creation of art. He graduated from Otis/Parsons in Los Angeles in 1990, and soon found himself supervising a staff of over thirty artists under pop art legend Hiro Yamagata on the Earthly Paradise collection and other projects. He began plein-air painting on mornings, weekends and after work, and eventually left his friend and patron Yamagata to pursue a career as a gallery artist.

For over a decade, he was the Vice President of the historic California Art Club, and his ability to critique a wide range of painting styles was critical to the rise of the club’s prominence in the 21st Century. He has held three solo museum exhibitions, at the Weisman Museum in Malibu, at the Aquarium of the Pacific Museum in Long Beach, and at the Carnegie Art Museum in Oxnard, as well as numerous solo gallery exhibitions.

Along with his partner Nansi Bielanski, he left the California Art Club in 2016 to develop a new style of art based on some of the conceptually intriguing aspects of Cubism, fused with Abstraction, Pop, Impressionism, and Realism. \ This work is often inspired by the SCUBA diving the couple enjoy, and depicts motion, confusion, and brightly colored reef life. These paintings are used to inspire conservation and ocean education. Many of the large canvases are collaborations between them both, working in turns or simultaneously on the same canvas. They work at their studio in Santa Rosa Valley, CA. (in the hills above Camarillo) David also holds a weekly Master Class in painting for established artists.

(Biography provided by Izen Miller Gallery)