James Watts has journeyed from the Pagan Sun Bursts of Lithuania to the vast deserts of the American West seeking inspiration for his singular vision. Born in San Francisco, the natural beauty of the American West and the meditative work of the Nineteenth Century California Tonalist painters was his starting point. "I have always been enchanted by views and vistas and their relationship to the solitary wanderers who carry with them their own inner landscapes. The eye acts as a kind of threshold between these two worlds." Educated at U.C. Berkeley and the California College of Arts in the late Seventies, James has participated in over fifty solo, group and juried shows across the country. He has received numerous awards and scholarships for his work. Beginning with traditional paintings on canvas, his work evolved into unique painting-sculpture hybrids. "Living in New York in the Eighties confirmed my long-held suspicion that painting on canvas was an exhausted enterprise. Yet the act of painting itself is always alive; a primordial, vital activity involving the physical manipulation of materials from our natural world to conform to an ideal, or at least an imagined, world of the mind." In the early Nineties James created a series of pure sculptures, using wood, stone, sponge, and wire. "I wanted to create objects pulled from an alternative nature, recognizable, yet completely different from our own." James continues to create sculptures in this vein, working with combinations of natural and man-made refuse. "When given a chance to pursue their own logic, their own dream, these abandoned materials never fail to give birth to something new. It's really an evolutionary process grounded in hope." The recent sculptures are treated with chemically oxidized metallic paints to give them a sense of found permanence. 'Guardian' is his first major bronze commission. Returning to painting, James began imagining what kind of landscape these sculptural creations might live in. He wanted to create a unique ground for this new series of paintings and experimented with a wide range of materials. "I searched for a heavy texture that matched the weight of the light and color of these landscapes. The landscapes themselves were vast and filled with wonder, but I realized I wanted the physical experience with the viewer to be on a small, intimate, almost private scale." James discovered slate to be the ideal support for his paintings. "I love the fact that the ground upon which these paintings rest has itself undergone a transformative experience. All slate under went a metamorphic journey millions of years ago, transforming, under tremendous heat and pressure, from beds of clay-like shale hidden deep within the earth into the hard, colorful stone we know today. The ancient age and wonderful varieties of colors and textures unique to the different slates from all over the world add to the meaning and presence of the paintings." James has enjoyed a successful career as an illustrator, illustrating 24 published books for children. His books have won numerous awards and his work has been shown in the Society of Illustrators Museum of American Illustration. He has also served as President of the Executive Board of Southern Exposure, the legendary San Francisco arts organization, and Vice-president ZYZZYVA, the West Coast literary Journal, and on the Advisory Board of The Prague Project, a U.S.-Czech Republic cultural exchange program. "I feel it's important for me to get out of the studio and get involved. Nonprofit arts organizations are the foundation of a healthy arts community and culture. Now more than ever." James also writes for the screen and has had several scripts optioned in Hollywood. James continues to produce sculpture and slate paintings at his San Francisco studio. "I really feel I have found my artistic home. The world of these paintings and sculpture... it's where I want to be."
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