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Jim Draper
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Jim grew up in Kosciusko, Mississippi – one hundred miles south of Oxford – where he graduated with a BFA from the University of Mississippi in 1974. “Kosciusko is half-way between Faulkner and Tennessee Williams,” the artist jokes. During MFA Graduate work, Draper was able to study with Elaine de Kooning, an influential abstract expressionist painter, and was immediately receptive to de Kooning’s emphasis on the importance of assembling a body of work with serial imagery. “By reworking a particular image over and over, I came to an understanding of the form. Once you’ve settled on the content and general composition within the format, it releases you to explore the pleasure of painting, to really jump into the process…you’re free to play with the color, texture and surface…all of us who are interested in abstract expressionism are mainly interested in the surface.” While on a painting retreat, Draper started to notice the palm trees on Cumberland Island, which are so tenacious and elegant.” “You seldom see a toppled palm tree, yet they live in the most adverse conditions and are very adaptable. I began to see in a single trunk or group of palm trees a very stable, soothing, solid image and in the solitary palms, an element of isolation.” The appeal of a Draper Palm is the impression of strength and calmness. He enjoys combining single images in palette-related diptychs or triptychs or larger groupings. He also enjoys painting the landscape and the flora and fauna of tropical and subtropical areas in oil and acrylic.
E N T E R  G A L L E R Y       A B O U T  T H E  G A L L E R Y       C O N T A C T  U S      E V E N T S      H O M E Bay St Gallery    719 Bay Street   Beaufort, SC 29902    gallery: 843.522.9210   studio: 843.525.1024