Ted Yao

Art is communication of an image with an emotional message and often the image is more powerful and meaningful when words are incorporated.  Artists think in terms of images and lawyers in terms of words.  I am a retired lawyer who came to art in mid career leading to an interest in the intersection between words and images.  This artist biography is one example.

Plein air painting, my foundation, is image-making with a signature place and time and I have pushed this into a travel poster-like format that writes the name of the municipality on the picture: Savannah, Albuquerque, Glendale, Scarborough.   Another series of images of vineyards contains the name of the winery and the “signature” grape, weaving the two without commercial intent: Ravine Winery – 2007 Redcoat.  (The lawyer in me obtained waivers from the wineries beforehand.)   Example three is a painting of the Kansas City Royals baseball team’s City of Surprise spring training facility with inset diagrams of fastball, slider. Example four is a depiction of a ruined shed in County Monaghan, Ireland, with the graffiti IRA and home (for home rule) to which I added my signature and the date of May 22, 2015, the date of the referendum on same sex marriage, which ushers in the “new” Ireland.