Festival Artist Profile: Creating the Illusion of Reality
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Published on Monday, 16 March 2009 21:39
Tom Cardamone says he's happy to be returning to Ave Maria's Festival of the Arts again with his paintings and drawings. "It was great last year," he says.
His wife, Ann, adds, "People were generally more into the artwork at this show than at other shows. They really looked at what you had, and were very receptive."
Tom started out with representational paintings, and noticed that people began saying they looked "just like a photograph." So, he got the idea to try trompe d'oeil painting with the goal of creating objects on canvas so real-looking that people would want to reach out and touch them. "It worked," he says.
He plans to include some pen and ink sketches too in his exhibit too.
"I knew I wanted to be an artist ever since I was six years old," he recalls. "In high school I was very serious." After he was finished his time in the service, Tom took private lessons at the Metropolitan Museum in New York City. "Later, I studied at The School of Visual Arts for three years. Then I became an illustrator."
Tom returned to The School of Visual Arts to become a part-time instructor for twenty years. When it became too difficult to keep up with both the demands of teaching and his graphics business, he gave up the teaching, but began painting.
Tom has taught at the Von Liebig Art Center and given private lessons in Naples, where he and Ann have a business, TCA Graphics. His art has been shown in galleries throughout the country as part of the International Guild of Realism, including the Guild's most recent exhibition at the Weatherburn Gallery in Naples.
