Dan Thoner

The creation of art for me is an act of reconciliation.
Through it I find the means to return to an instinctive
impulse where mind and body work in unison with the
medium unencumbered by rational thought.
I've always been a representational artist but since
getting back into painting, the application of the paint
and exploration of color have taken on a greater
importance than the subjects' likeness. Brush strokes and
the interaction of color now determine how the subject
is to be portrayed rather than, as in the past, making the
medium conform to the subject. My painting style
remains representational but I hope to obtain a
more subliminal level of interpretation.

With minimal formal art education, trial and error
provided most of my art education. I've worked as a
portrait artist at Disneyland, as a carpenter, as a stained
glass artist, as a production artist at a graphic design
studio, and spent the last twenty years working
as a freelance illustrator in advertising.

My wife and I moved from San Diego to the Pine Hills
area of Julian in 2006. Having grown up in rural
Wisconsin and Minnesota I find many similarities to the
pastoral landscapes of my childhood.