Stan Vosburg: Homefront Aviation Art
Tuesday, August 20, 2019 - Saturday, November 23, 2019
Stan Vosburg, was a resident of Orange, was born in Richmond, California on December 7, 1942, the first anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack. When he was 12, his family moved to Anaheim, and Stan began working at Disneyland as a guidebook seller, alongside a kid named Steve Martin (who would grow up to become the famous comedian).
“My interest was piqued by the art of Walt Disney,” Vosburg recalls of that period. His artist/art teacher mother encouraged his fascination with drawing and painting. He also loved and absorbed the influential art of such great illustrators as Howard Pyle, N.C. Wyeth and Rockwell, as well as the 17th Century Dutch and Flemish painters.
The Southern California of the 1950s in which Vosburg grew up was also a focal point of the nation’s aviation industry, home to many aircraft manufacturers and military airfields. Soon, aviation and the space program became his main interests, and his art was relegated to merely a hobby.
After graduating from Cal Poly Pomona with a degree in mathematics, Vosburg took the Air Force pilot written exam, but failed the eye test. Undeterred, he chose another aviation path. “I was hired by the Northrop Company in Anaheim to begin what turned out to be a 39-year career as a structural analyst in the aerospace defense industry,” says Vosburg.
His engineering work – which included being a member of the team that designed and installed the tiles of the Space Shuttle’s thermal protection system – instilled in Vosburg an attention to the details of how mechanical elements look and work.
And then he became one of those almost-mythical creatures, a late-bloomer artist who can actually paint, and paint well. To relieve job stress, he took a series of painting classes at Fullerton College from instructor Bob Egan, and joined the American Society of Aviation Artists. He sought a way to mesh his love of aviation and aeronautical history with his newly rediscovered love and talent for art.
Vosburg begins each of his “Homefront Aviation” paintings with a deep dive into research, poring through old Life and Saturday Evening Post magazines and frequenting libraries and local archives, as well as his own extensive collection of aviation books. “I believe this research and my realistic style of depiction make these period paintings a window into one of aviation’s most exciting eras; a shared experience for airplane lovers of all ages,” he says.
He’s been honored with many prizes and awards for his paintings. “Impressing the Night Shift” was re-created as a “living art” tableau at the 1999 Pageant of the Masters in Laguna Beach.
Vosburg sells paper and fine-art metal prints, and paper and canvas giclée's of his work on his website, www.stanvosburg.com.
Mary Platt, Curator
Image:
Stan Vosburg
"Impressing the Night Shift"
1995
Oil on canvas
Courtesy of the artist
“My interest was piqued by the art of Walt Disney,” Vosburg recalls of that period. His artist/art teacher mother encouraged his fascination with drawing and painting. He also loved and absorbed the influential art of such great illustrators as Howard Pyle, N.C. Wyeth and Rockwell, as well as the 17th Century Dutch and Flemish painters.
The Southern California of the 1950s in which Vosburg grew up was also a focal point of the nation’s aviation industry, home to many aircraft manufacturers and military airfields. Soon, aviation and the space program became his main interests, and his art was relegated to merely a hobby.
After graduating from Cal Poly Pomona with a degree in mathematics, Vosburg took the Air Force pilot written exam, but failed the eye test. Undeterred, he chose another aviation path. “I was hired by the Northrop Company in Anaheim to begin what turned out to be a 39-year career as a structural analyst in the aerospace defense industry,” says Vosburg.
His engineering work – which included being a member of the team that designed and installed the tiles of the Space Shuttle’s thermal protection system – instilled in Vosburg an attention to the details of how mechanical elements look and work.
And then he became one of those almost-mythical creatures, a late-bloomer artist who can actually paint, and paint well. To relieve job stress, he took a series of painting classes at Fullerton College from instructor Bob Egan, and joined the American Society of Aviation Artists. He sought a way to mesh his love of aviation and aeronautical history with his newly rediscovered love and talent for art.
Vosburg begins each of his “Homefront Aviation” paintings with a deep dive into research, poring through old Life and Saturday Evening Post magazines and frequenting libraries and local archives, as well as his own extensive collection of aviation books. “I believe this research and my realistic style of depiction make these period paintings a window into one of aviation’s most exciting eras; a shared experience for airplane lovers of all ages,” he says.
He’s been honored with many prizes and awards for his paintings. “Impressing the Night Shift” was re-created as a “living art” tableau at the 1999 Pageant of the Masters in Laguna Beach.
Vosburg sells paper and fine-art metal prints, and paper and canvas giclée's of his work on his website, www.stanvosburg.com.
Mary Platt, Curator
Image:
Stan Vosburg
"Impressing the Night Shift"
1995
Oil on canvas
Courtesy of the artist