As a child my grandmother taught me how to paint. Her artist friends also taught me to sketch trees and I would sit for hours whisking tree branch after branch in charcoal. In grade school I loved drawing the exaggerated looks of comic book characters, and that soon drew me to arcade games. A love of electronics, pixels, and computers followed. This set me on life of Art and Technology, including college classes in both computer engineering and fine art. The 2 became one with my BA degree in graphic design.

Post grad I helped start the apparel company TravisMathew where I've lead the design department for 14 years. In my current VP of Design position I have the unique opportunity to source materials around the world. A love for travel resulted and I would spend every vacation day I had extending days to my travel to explore the unknown.

When I was younger and I would sketch a tree or landscape, I felt like I was collecting it in a way. I had been seeing so many things on my travels to foreign lands, but I needed more, I needed to 'collect' my experiences. Enter photography ... my next obsession. My philosophy in photography is to let it push me to go further than I was before, and to open my eyes even wider.

Over all these years the biggest constant in my life was painting. Between jobs, studies, travel, and other hobbies, I never stopped my paint brush. It's the thing most familiar to me, and yet so challenging. It's my 100% pure escape and unrestrained expression. I've done over 20 shows in Los Angeles in my art career and sold over 100 pieces.

What's happening now? I continue to design and travel by trade. My photography hunting is ever-expansive. In addition, I've been painting my latest art series called "Sometimes the World is not so Simple" that will be concluding in 2022.

Thank you for jointing me on this adventure.

~ Joey