"Bringing the Museum to You"

 

By permission of the artist, The Cyber Art Show is pleased to feature a 12-piece Exhibition  of works by American contemporary Impressionist painter Jacob Aguiar (born 1984  in Manhattan, Kansas).

 

Jacob has been been an artist his entire life. He remembers, as a kid, staying up until midnight drawing comic book characters with friends or sitting in the car while his parents ran errands so he could draw what he saw out the window. He was an avid lover of the outdoors from an early age, playing in the woods in rural Kansas. It wasn't until 2011 that his love of art and his love of nature found each other.

 

Burned out in naturopathic medical school, he took a leave of absence his third year of school to spend time with family and to pursue art. Jacob spent that year in the small Northern California town of Sebastopol. It didn't take long before he realized he was surrounded by some of the most beautiful landscapes in America. At that point, he lacked direction, debating whether he should try watercolor, pen-and-ink drawing, oils or one of the many other media.

 

Jacob was searching the internet for inspiration and direction when he stumbled across the landscape pastels of Richard McKinley and became hooked immediately. Not only were McKinley's paintings incredibly beautiful, he had found a way to combine media in such a creative way. Jacob immediately purchased his first set of Rembrandt pastels, and began his journey of capturing the beauty of the natural world with these little sticks of pigment. 

 

That year Jacob traveled throughout the west, studying with several incredible pastel artists, including Richard McKinley, Albert Handell, Clark Mitchell, and Marla Baggetta. He began entering and was accepted into several national shows including IAPS, Pastel Society of the West Coast, Northwest Pastel Society, Pastel Painters of Maine, and Pastel Painter Society of Cape Cod. Despite his love of pastels and painting outdoors, he returned to Seattle to finish his last two years of school. 

Jacob has since graduated from school and is practicing his two passions simultaneously. He works three days per week as a naturopathic doctor in Portsmouth, NH, and much of his off time is devoted to his art. Having a foot in two distinctly different worlds allows him to maintain perspective, and find passion in what he's doing each and every day. 

 

Jacob is happy to announce that two of his paintings, Turquoise and Gold, and Carmel Dunes have received Honorable Mention awards in the 2015 Pastel Journal's Pastel 100 competition. This competition received over 2,000 submissions this year, and 100 were selected for awards.