Peter Bartczak

I was born on boring Long Island, New York, in 1951 and was always drawing. And always throwing my drawings out in frustration. And my parents were always rescuing them from the garbage and saving them.

It wasn’t until my inspiring tenth grade art teacher that I seriously considered art as a career and was accepted two years later to prestigious Pratt Institute in New York City, more on the strength of my animated movies than my drawing or painting skills. At Pratt, I was a kid at a candy shop and tried every media I could get my hands on –- welding, ceramics, lithography, intaglio, painting, photography, film making, and silk screening. I changed majors from fine art to advertising to film making during my four years. Summer classes at the School of Visual Arts added to my knowledge of video and still photography.

I left New York in 1972 and moved to San Francisco, where I started Clownbank Studio and taught myself how to airbrush. In the beginning, I was a street artist in San Francisco’s Fisherman’s wharf airbrushing T-shirts right then and there for the tourists. Over the years, I taught myself how to airbrush murals, illustrations, and signs and graduated to freelancing for advertising agencies and for clients such as Dell Books, Disney, 6 Flags Discovery Kingdom, Universal Studio Tours, Atari, Silicon Graphics, and Buck Owens Productions.

Early in the '90s I threw my hat into the public art arena and over the years have worked with the art commissions of Gilroy, Santa Cruz, Salt Lake City, Chico, Sacramento, and Palo Alto. I prefer public art because of the greater chances for self expression and public service, but I value the experience that had I gained as an artist and also as a business man from the commercial art field.
All along, I saw each challenge as an opportunity to be excellent and was fiercely determined to do the best job I could.
I currently live in Soquel, Calif. I am available for commissions.