Steve Brosnac Creative Arts

  

This painting is to commemorate my cousin Darro Grieco's worldwide award winning Olive Oil. This painting attempts to recreate my first visit to the grove last year following a rainstorm. I've never tasted Olive oil like this, amazing! Also, one of his and his wife's (Olivia) horses is 45 years old, and is pictured in this painting.

This is a commission piece that includes symbolic imagery that I came up with during the early stages of development. The emotions this painting attempts to evoke are meant to parallel the ebb and flow of lifes struggles and accomplishments

Third in my Masters Series, this is my tribute to artist Salvador Dali. Everything in this painting is symbolic of Dali. The bat actually references his childhood, when he saw a live bat being eaten alive by ants. He felt it appropriate to take a bite out of the bat! The fire ant is the balloon's flame, and in Dali art, ants represent death and decay. Also, if you look closely at the magic mushroom, you'll see the face of his wife, Gala. She was the cause of his meltdown in my painting(most of his later art features her, as he worshiped her but it wasn't reciprocal. She had many affairs and lived a separate life most of the time.) His art featuring her is much less valuable, so I've heard, hence why I showed her mushroom form(her being his 'drug' of choice) powering the outlet (and his imagination) causing the meltdown (melting being another Dali trait) Dali used to say he didn't do drugs, but that he was drugs, but he did do a documentary spoof in Which he and others were looking for the elusive psychoactive mushrooms in the Andes, I think, which is another reason I incorporated the mushroom. if you look at the outlet upside down, it has the shape of a giraffe which is meant to symbolize personal struggle.. The fan has human female limbs and was my symbolism, addition, connecting the scent /desire of a woman to his meltdown. His elephants are an inspiration in his art, and he painted them with such long spindly legs as to make them appear weightless. This is why I used an elephant as the balloon basket, being weightless. The elephant is attempting to put out the flames (ant-death) and save his life. Not that it will help much, because then the balloon will fall into the ocean where you will find many human skull shapes (more Dali symbolism). The eye in Dali's works represent the way humans perceive reality, and is why I chose to include a watchful eye, coming from Gala (his wife's name) and it hovers slightly above his eye line. I was inspired by a black and white photo of Dali, and used my own spot lit self portrait to add completely different lighting to Dali. At a recent Gallery show, someone commented that she thought Dali was suppose to be me. "Maybe just the forehead", I told her.

This piece was inspired by Ernest Hemingway and his fishing vessel, Pilar. He also used the name Pilar for his 3rd wife as a fond term of endearment that can mean most beautiful. The setting is the famed Malecon Ave. in Cuba. This piece needs to be seen in person, as it really glows!

1st in my Masters Series, which will be a portrait of the art master in my style, with surrounding artwork of my design which was inspired by that master

This painiting was inspired by my love of the ocean and of history. There is nothing more majestic than seeing a Tallship on the open ocean. this piece is significant in that it is the first painting I created after losing my Mother. I was feeling helplessness and loss, yet the light of hope, understanding and direction of art therapy helped to guide me.. The bottle you will find after some searching through the waves signifies all the things left unsaid to my Mom, and all of the love and admiration I had for the caring person she was. She saved many lives of neonatal infants during her 30+ years as an NICU R.N. She made me so proud and was a wonderful caring person who's life was cut short by her struggle with bi-polar disorder.

This is my largest piece to date (not counting my mural), sized at 4x6 feet. It was created in a style similar to my late uncle, Steve Wheeler's, and started as lines drawn on paper. The lines visulally stood out to me as shapes that I developed, and it transitioned into a hand...a hand of a puppet master. We are all our own masters, but sometimes we don't understand our own subconcious desires and decision making processes. We need to look within to understand how to control our lives from inside our mind and heart.

My wife is a psychotherapist, and thought Freud would make a good study. Freud is my first oil painted portrait. I wanted to make the viewer feel as though Freud could look through their eyes no matter the viewing angle and uncover that which troubles them.

As my first non-ocean landscape, I wanted to create a feeling of being grounded by choosing to trade my typical turbulent ocean paintings for a peaceful vision of directional choices. Painting the feeling of a calm and quiet foggy Central Valley morning paralleled my own need to realise, that while I could not be certain of my future, I could choose the path that led to it.

Second of my Masters Series, which will be a portrait of the art master in my style, with surrounding artwork of my design which was inspired by that master. This piece highlights Van Gogh's Self Admission into the Saint-Paul Asylum in Saint-Rémy, France. Mental Illness runs in my family, so Van Gogh's tortured life and internal struggles that culminated in him taking his own life, resonates strongly with me.

This is my 4th installment of my Masters Series, and features my tribute to Gustav Klimp. This has been my biggest challenge to date, and was very rewarding. I learned so much about working with gold, silver and copper, and felt like I understood this master a little better once I completed this tribute. I learned Klimt borrowed many patterns from the Byzantine era, as well as Egyptian Greek designs. I did my best to borrow from those eras as well, but patterns that I did not recognize as his (other than the swirls) In this piece I used 24k gold, pure silver, pure copper, ground mother-of-pearl and oil paint on craddled panel with a gilded frame. NFS

famed 19th-century abolitionist leader and U.S. gov't official.

This place is the favorite spot in the world for many, and a sunset there inspired this painting, which was donated to a local non profit. My Mother took us to the central coast amost weekly, so this area of the world is close to my heart.

This painting was inspired by the Naval Art Master, Ivan Aivazovsky and his many oceanic workks.

Inspired by the passing of my mother in 2016.

An American Icon.

This painting is another that was inspired by Aivazovsky's works.

This painting was inspired by a recent trip my wife and I took to visit her cousin in Big Sur. We had driven by the Pfiffer Beach exit off of hwy 1 many times in our lives but never stopped there. It has to be one of the most beautiful beaches in California, and is a must see when driving Hwy 1.

This was a Christmas present for one of my Brother-In-Laws.

This acrylic painting was my first award winner, taking 3rd place in The American Art Awards international art competition. I had been painting only a few months, so you can imagine my shock and elation. It was inspired by my time on a large ship I was on in the Caribbean Ocean in the 90's. The ship left port in Puerto Rico just as Hurricane Hortense was coming close. That first night was intense, filled with terror and awe as 40ft swells rocked the ship and made it feel like a dinghy.

This piece was inspired by the many trips to the Central Coast of California during my childhood. I remember being in the water and seeing as well as feeling what I'm sure of to this day was a small shark. Everyone thought I was crazy when I ran out of the water.

One of my favorite actors.

Surfing inspired!

This is one stand up man, who continues to serve society as a Humanitarian. He is a 2002 Nobel Peace Prize recipient.

This is my first wave painting. I've tried to recreate it a number of times, but I always fail. I truly need to be in a trance to create, and never feel it is 100% truly ME that creates when I'm in that dream land. It's part of what makes the acceptance of praise difficut for me.

R.I.P

Everyone loves Sinatra!

This is the point in which I started to jump out of the bounds of charcoal.

This is my first acrylic portrait.

Seeing a whale breach like this happens once, In a Blue Moon. Contact me regarding purchasing a limited edition enhanced Giclée. 2 of 200 is available now.

This was the first painting in which I discovered glazing, and begam to understand how to use layers of pain in thin glazes to show detail from underneath. It was quite a pivital, Aha! moment for me. I could have learned this by reading, but my constant pain and chaotic mind makes concentration difficult. Because my pain perception is diminished when I'm artistically creating, learning through discovery was the only way for me. I hae since done some reading about art, namely to learn about the masters and the knowledge gained has served to confirm many of my self taught methods.

This piece was created for a close friend in Conneticut. He conceptualized the idea which I brought to life.

My first painting, and acrylic done in March 2016.

I'm a nature and science geek, so this drawing was inspired by the voice of The Planet Earth TV series, Sir David Attenborough.

A look into my brain.

This is my first attempt at creating water on a dfferent level. Again, I was in a trance and could not recreate this if I tried.

This is my second painting, done around March, 2016.

Einstein is my kind of guy. He was a star geek as I was and still am. His understanding of the universe inspired my astronomy hobby as a child. I would make star charts from public library book and use them to chart the planets movements. I remember sneaking out in the early am to see Saturn and Jupiter with my telescope. I can't imagine a time in my life that was more profound than seeing Saturns rings with my own eyes. If you look close into this Einsteins eyes, you might be able to see the same Saturn and Jupiter I saw as a young child.

This painting was created for a friend who works For California forestry to fight wild fires.

This painting was among the first that I started seeing things that weren't there yet. I imagined them, which made painting them possible.

This is where I asked my wife and high school sweetheart, Carol, to marry me.

A drawing for one of my Sister-In-Laws of the horse she had when she was younger.

Olympian

I drew this for a friend who was a Dog Handler during the Vietnam War.

I attempted to age progress an earlier image of Hamilton.