Welcome
Richard Hutman, artist
Once, I studied architecture and urban design and traveled the world in search of fabled cities. The transition from design to project management that led to California and the challenge of complex landmark projects like the Getty Center had also laid bare a lingering, unsatisfied need for art. I awakened and honed long-dormant art skills. Drawing, painting, and travel went hand in hand: discovering ancient civilizations, sacred sites, villages - and the people that inhabit them. Sketching engraved them in my memory.
Drawings
I have always drawn. From the beginning, I enjoyed it. Growing up, my brother and I took Saturday art classes at the Baltimore Museum of Art. I remember a book of DaVinci figure drawings at home. After a while, you start doing something, find that you enjoy it, and keep on doing it. I’ve sketched on paper napkins and drawn and painted in parades, freezing weather, ocean liners, zodiacs, buses, parks, concerts, museums, and endless meetings. Drawing has been in my life so long, that after decades of it I can barely imagine my life without it. Sometimes, on very good days, the pencil dances.
Watercolors
Jim Urmston introduced me to watercolors, and for that I owe him a great deal of thanks. He kept urging me to retire and paint. I particularly enjoyed painting the human figure. Travel, drawing, and painting went hand in hand. Beginning in the 1980’s, 11”x14”, 60-page Aquabee spiral notebooks accompanied me on every trip. Along with Schmincke watercolors, water, a variety of brushes, and collapsible Japanese cups, they fit neatly in a knapsack. The result was watercolors from the Arctic Circle, to the Galapagos, to Antarctica and from the ancient cities of Machu Picchu and Angkor Wat to Palenque.
Folded paper
In 2009, I began to integrate design-related skills and interests: drawing, painting, travel, architecture, cities, structure and pattern. Using folded paper, I explored and created cities of the imagination. Initially, I conceived Lost Cities as if newly unearthed and recently discovered – an artifact created by long-forgotten master builders unfettered by architectural tradition, precedent, or constraint. My search for Lost Cities had begun. The catalyst was a building block of folded letter-size paper – covered in original drawings, paintings, color, and pattern. Where others had seen a book, I found a structure. Subtle variations in connecting identical blocks generate distinct forms for each work. Fourteen years, 100 works, nine variations, and nine Lost Cities later, my search continues for rich possibilities waiting to be discovered in simple things.
Gallery
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