Michael Schofield

Although Schofield was born in Orlando, Florida, he moved to California that same year. He started painting and studying the watercolor medium while still in high school. Like other teenage boys, Schofield was much more interested in sports than fine art, but his art teacher at Oakland High School recognized a very special talent. For nearly two years, Schofield’s teacher tutored him privately to develop his talent in the watercolour medium. After high school he went into the military, and then on to art school in Nashville, Tennessee. During the summers, Schofield journeyed to Woodstock, New York to study with well known watercolourist John Pike (National Academy of Art, American Watercolour Society), a contemporary of Robert Wood. Schofield soon opened his own art studio where he taught and painted for twelve years. 

Upon his return to California in 1980, he opened his own silkscreen printing studio so that he could create his own original serigraph editions. An original serigraph utilizes the silkscreen printmaking medium. The image is created by stenciling elements of colour and imagery onto screen (silk is no longer used). Each screen represents a layer of colour and imagery. The image is built successively with every new screen and colour that is applied to the paper. 

As a successful artist for several years, Schofield’s work can be found in many private and corporate collections. A sampling of them include: the Bank of America, the Library of Congress, Xerox Corporation, Occidental, and 20th Century Inc. 

Schofield believes that fundamentally, art is communication. He chooses to create more traditional landscapes because it is imagery with which most people relate. It is imagery that evokes a memory and therefore a feeling. In this manner, the artists and those who live with his art share a common experience.