Adrian Gottlieb is considered to be one of the best living portrait painters in the world. A true poet with paint, he manages to imbue his works with an exceptional sensitivity that sets him aside from many of his technically acclaimed peers.
Gottlieb’s extensive artistic training began with a year stint at Carnegie Melon in Pittsburg. He moved on to study illustration at the Rochester Institute of Technology before finding a pamphlet for a studio run by Charles Cecil in Florence. It had been extremely hard finding a school dedicated to the continuation of our Western painting tradition.
“When I left high school, in 1994, the Internet was more of a toy than anything at that point, and not a very good source for research,” Gottlieb remembered.
“But when I arrived in Florence, I knew I was exactly where I needed to be. Florence was the capital of the Southern Renaissance, and the qualities of the place that gave the world Michelangelo and Botticelli were everywhere. The result was a complete immersion into the historical that helped to shape the sensitivities I required as a painter.”
After three years of alternating between Cecil Studios’ summer courses and completing his illustration degree, Gottlieb went on to study at Daniel Graves’s Florence Academy of Art full time for an additional three years. He then returned to the United States and subsequently to California where he has been living since, working as a portrait and figurative painter.
“Even as I paint the figure, which I very much enjoy, the portrait remains the most remarkable aspect of the painting. It’s the psychological center of interest,” Gottlieb said.
Mood is a very important and recognizable aspect of his work.
“I am deeply inspired by the sense of quiet, dignity and honesty of the works of the Dutch Masters, and it is these qualities that continue to guide what I deem to be a successful work. I want to communicate to the viewer that the subject in the painting is thoroughly human and that the very moment in time they occupy is defined by nobility.”
