Samuel Shelton

The Gift Giver
Oil on Panel
30 x 24 inches

I am a husband and father of six children and live in the small rural town of Meridian which is located deep in the heart of Texas. Often, I use my children and my wife to model for my paintings as well as people I know in this same small town or the towns surrounding it. I am a traditionalist at heart in my methods and materials. I use the purest paint I can find commercially as well as making use of my own hand mulled oil paint and sun thickened mediums. I prefer a traditional palette of earth colors, much like the old masters, with the occasional accent of a bright blue, green, red or yellow; but by and large my colors are natural earths.

I have grown to love oil painting in all its aspects; the smells, the texture, the nostalgia of an old world craft, the sound of a crank easel being raised to start the days’ work, and the thrill of bringing to life something out of nothing. I learned to love painting by a close friend, just 2 years older than I, who taught me the rudiments of the trade, but who died tragically at the young age of 31. I acquired many of his materials and a few old and unfinished biblical paintings and feel it my honor and obligation to continue down a journey that he opened my eyes to the existence of.

I paint because at heart I am a storyteller. Painting is meant to be used as a sort of visual language-one that all humanity can understand. What moves me to be a storyteller in paint is the overarching, ruling, and grand story of all of history; it is the story of the beauty and brokenness of mankind as we relate to the beautiful and powerful God who made us in his image. Power, beauty, and brokenness; these are the themes that move me. My task is to tell tales of these themes in such a way that the viewer is compelled to stop and consider the larger plot. Why such beauty? Why is this beauty always tainted by brokenness? And why is the somberness of it all so powerful? What is the purpose of the powerfully broken and somber beauty of us? I want to tell of truths that are greater than the trivialities of our generation. To that end, what is more enchanting than the beauty of the human form? What is more consuming than the raw power of God? What compels us more to pity and charity than the brokenness of mankind? I want to capture these kinds of stories in paint.

Junyi Liu

Holly Siniscal