Jim Wider is a unique artist who creates from his childhood memories of the
south a genre that commands attention visually and emotionally. Somehow avoiding
the enormous pressures of the changing trends and influences that all artists
face, he follows his own course - pulling images from both his memories and
from folklore.
His interest in art began as a young boy scratching drawings in the dirt with
a stick in Columbia, South Carolina. As he grew, so did his talent and the selection
of art as his life's work. Concluding his formative years with a BFA degree
from the University of Southern Colorado, he selected the beautiful city of
Colorado Springs near Pikes Peak for his home and studio.
Mr. Wider is also a businessman; however, his business evolves from his art.
An admirable trait is his ability to make a living from his art through his
own gallery in Colorado Springs while at the same time not compromising his
ability to paint his memories in his own distrinctive fashion. As a painter
and gallery owner he publicizes and markets his own work, and his work is represented
in many private collections. Jim Wider's realism in the marketplace complements
his personal view of art.
Mr. Wider has exhibited his art in numerous one-man shows and higher learning
institutions to include the National Art Club, New York City, New York, the
Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum (Austin, Texas), George Washington
Carver Museum (Austin, Texas), and Mann-Simons Museum of African-American Culture
(Columbia, South Carolina). These museums all have permanent collections of
Mr. Wider's art on exhibit. Further, he has exhibited his art work at major
juried arts festivals throughout the country.
Mr. Wider's art is basically traditional, his preparation techniques are inventive.
He prefers to work on textured surface, so he often incorporates fabric bits,
crushed dried paints, sawdust, and other materials bonded together is a slurry
of gesso which he trowels and works onto the face of the painting surface.
Before beginning his work he studies this extremely rough surface so as to wed
the shapes suggested in the texture to the painted image. His preferred media
are oil and watercolor. He finds it exciting to be able to express himself using
different media, and explains, "I have never found any form of art to be
dull."
This homepage and all of its contents are Copyrighted © 1995 by Jim Wider.