RESUME
ABOUT THE ARTIST
John Coppola is an American fine art painter, lecturer, and writer from New York. He received his preparatory training in drawing and painting at the Art Students League in New York City where he later went on to pursue his artistic degree, an MFA in painting awarded in 1995 from the Graduate School of Figurative Art at the New York Academy of Art in Manhattan.
His work has sold independently to private collections in Umbria, Italy, as well as Shanghai and Beijing, China.
ARTISTIC STATEMENT
My paintings have many influences. Ancient Roman Frescoes, Gothic Stained Glass, Early Renaissance Sculpture and Painting, Modern Artists like Paul Gauguin and Amedeo Modigliani and American Abstraction come together in many different combinations and techniques in my work.
I never use models, or paint from photographs. For me painting from photographs is not fine art. It is only craft. This is because it does not include the creative process of going from imagination to handmade drawing to choice of color scheme, technique and final painting process.
I do not believe that anything, or everything, can be art. True art comes from hard work and the fearless acceptance of extraordinary inspiration. Fine Art is unique work set apart and outside the parameters of ordinary experience.