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Tomasz Rut was born in Warsaw, and raised by a father who was an Olympic athlete and a mother who was an artist herself. "The first thing I remember in my life is drawing," says Rut. "I think I did that before I spoke." His parents, true lovers of the arts and culture, exposed Rut to the Pompeian Frescoes as well as Renaissance and Baroque art early in his childhood. This Polish born artist was a true prodigy and accordingly at the age of eleven, Rut had his first exhibition of drawings. By his early teens, he started working in oils. He went on to study art conservation at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw. After graduation this talented artist came to America and continued his education at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn and at Columbia University in Manhattan. Eventually, he started working on major projects in art conservation for the Biltmore House in Asheville, North Carolina, and traveled the east coast restoring large scale murals in museums and mansions for such clients as the Smithsonian Institute and the U.S. Treasury Department in Washington D.C., the New Jersey State House in Trenton, the Gusman Center for the Arts and Vizcaya Museum in Miami. The aesthetics, perspective and lighting perfected by Michelangelo, Raphael, Rubens and other great masters are so ingrained in Rut that he is able to exquisitely create contemporary works incorporating their techinques. His intense fascination with anatomy, human emotion and dramatic poses fill his resplendent works. Interesting too are the patina and aging finishes that are achieved in his images which are reminiscent of the frescoes and old works that inspired Rut in his youth. This added to the drama, the scale and the power of the pieces result in remarkable, passionate works of art. "My paintings give people the ability to learn, respond and feel comfortable with the classics," Rut says. "This gives me enough satisfaction to keep working for a lifetime." |