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William Acheff
A trompe
l’oeil oil painter known for his highly realistic still lifes, often
combining objects of the present and the past, William Acheff became a
resident in 1973 of Hondo, New Mexico (near Taos) where he has his
studio at his home.
He was born in Alaska and moved with his family to San Francisco when he
was five years old. Acheff lived in the Bay Area for twenty years and
began painting in 1969 when, working as a barber, he came in contact
with Roberto Lupetti, an Italian artist. Acheff took art lessons from
Lupetti, receiving as well more mundane help, including marketing advice
with gallery representation in northern California.
At first Acheff worked from photographs, but changed his technique to
working from the objects themselves. He positions his subjects several
feet from his easel and paints them in the northern light of his studio.
Acheff is intrigued by what he calls “the ethnic quality of the
artifacts. There’s a purity in them. Nothing’s manufactured by machine.
There sits a pot. The whole mood of what went into making that pot is a
story, and that’s what I want to capture.”
Acheff brings to his art a background rich with influences of his
Georgian and Athabascan Indian heritage. His work is noted for an
incorporation of Native American pottery, drums, blankets, fetishes and
other arrangements of Southwestern memorabilia and relics. He states, “I
always find that artifacts and traditions of the past seem to hold more
mystical and aesthetic values than those of contemporary times."
Fortunately, his proximity to the numerous New Mexico pueblos provides
Acheff with a fertile field for such portrayals.
Reference:
AskArt.com
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