Artist Focus: Scott Ferguson

During his 15 years working as a sequential artist and digital painter in the comic and gaming industry, Scott Ferguson learned the importance of composition, conceptual development and creating a strong narrative. These base fundamentals would eventually lead him to fine art with his primary media being oil paint.Council, oil, 30 x 40"Drawn to the brilliant works of impressionism done by old and modern masters, Ferguson uses an array of wet-on-wet techniques prioritizing “messy” thick brushstrokes, strong light sources and a limited palette in his paintings. Living in Colonial and Victorian homes surrounded by the wilderness of Pennsylvania, he learned to celebrate the oddities and curiosities of historic architecture, memorabilia and animals that are reflected in his work creating a contrast in his portrait studies of threatened and endangered wildlife.

Seamstress, oil, 24 x 36"

Uncanny Valley, oil, 12 x 24"“As humans, we’ve strived for a connection with wildlife, to observe their intelligence, playfulness and beauty. That’s reflected in our everyday lives through the tools we use, the stories we tell and I’ve always embraced celebrating that interrelation,” he says. “Growing up on my family’s farm, nearly every day was spent trying to view some sort of wild animal with my tattered Audubon field guide tucked under my arm." After running himself ragged from adventures, he would return to a home filled with beautifully-made old tools from his grandfather ,who was a leatherworker and toymaker, and my mother, a painter herself. “It’s no wonder that these everyday interactions would ingrain themselves in me and become favorite subjects to paint nearly forty years later.” —