2007.01.02: January 2, 2007: Headlines: COS - Paraguay: Art: Painting: Alamogordo Daily News: Paraguay RPCV Phil Yost has painted off and on since he was a child but didn't become obsessed with the craft until roughly 11 years ago
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2007.01.02: January 2, 2007: Headlines: COS - Paraguay: Art: Painting: Alamogordo Daily News: Paraguay RPCV Phil Yost has painted off and on since he was a child but didn't become obsessed with the craft until roughly 11 years ago
Paraguay RPCV Phil Yost has painted off and on since he was a child but didn't become obsessed with the craft until roughly 11 years ago
He always painted in oils before that, but saw a water color painting by a Las Cruces artist and took it up. "I bought some supplies and started doing it," he said. "It was pretty ugly at first." Yost said he cannot recall the name of the artist and that has always bothered him because the unknown painter was the source of so much inspiration for him. The Alamogordo show will feature, among other works, several paintings from a river trip Yost took with his brother in 2003. The two floated down 50 miles of the Missouri River on a trip that paid tribute to explorers Lewis and Clark. The excursion lasted 150 miles, but Yost said he only went for 50 because the first third wasn't particularly scenic and the weather turned sour. He said a person could only get off the river every 50 miles. "You had to stick with it until you got to the end, another two or three days," he said. Nevertheless he netted 30 paintings from the voyage, 15 of which will he still has.
Paraguay RPCV Phil Yost has painted off and on since he was a child but didn't become obsessed with the craft until roughly 11 years ago
Flick's featured artist boasts a busy life
Alamogordo Daily News
By John Bear, Staff Writer
Article Launched: 01/02/2007 12:00:00 AM MST
Caption: Phil Yost's forte is realistic, detailed watercolor paintings. His favorite subjects are the Gila Wilderness, Southwestern landscapes, and old structures and machinery. Photo: Phil Yost
Phil Yost is a painter.
But he is a whole lot of other things as well.
He's a former high school and college wrestler, worked for the Peace Corps in Paraguay, taught science at Mayfield High School and loves the outdoors.
In fact, all of his paintings, landscapes mostly, come from actual places he's been.
Yost is the featured artist for the month of January at Flickinger Center for the Performing Arts.
He said people don't usually equate the rugged outdoorsman type with artists.
Other artists he has crossed paths with have cringed at the thought of roughing it out in the wilderness.
"I'm not some guy who majored in art in college," he said.
He explained he doesn't sit around thinking of something to paint, but rather, grabs a camera and hits the trail.
Yost didn't start off as an artist. He got his master's in forestry at Duke University after receiving his bachelor's from Gettysburg University.
He worked for the Forest Service for a few years in Montana, Idaho and New Mexico. He then decided he wanted "to do something for my fellow man" and returned to college, this time at Western New Mexico University in Silver City. He got his teaching certificate and taught mostly science 9 but a little Spanish as well 9 in New Mexico high schools, retiring from Mayfield High School in 2000.
He said he has painted off and on since he was a child but didn't become obsessed with the craft until roughly 11 years ago. He always painted in oils before that, but saw a water color painting by a Las Cruces artist and took it up.
"I bought some supplies and started doing it," he said. "It was pretty ugly at first."
Yost said he cannot recall the name of the artist and that has always bothered him because the unknown painter was the source of so much inspiration for him.
The Alamogordo show will feature, among other works, several paintings from a river trip Yost took with his brother in 2003. The two floated down 50 miles of the Missouri River on a trip that paid tribute to explorers Lewis and Clark. The excursion lasted 150 miles, but Yost said he only went for 50 because the first third wasn't particularly scenic and the weather turned sour. He said a person could only get off the river every 50 miles.
"You had to stick with it until you got to the end, another two or three days," he said.
Nevertheless he netted 30 paintings from the voyage, 15 of which will he still has.
The show will feature mostly Southwest landscapes, such as old missions from Santa Fe and scenes from the Gila wilderness.
Yost said he generally sticks to landscapes because he finds painting the human form difficult. He painted a rodeo clown for a client once, but insists that was cheating because the makeup clowns wear obscures the details on a human face.
His favorite painter is Charlie Russell, a man Yost said traveled to Montana in the 1880s and focused mainly on Native American-themed work. One of his murals hangs in the capitol building in Helena, Mont.
Yost said Russell would often paint fictional battle scenes but the background was always an actual locale. Yost likes that aspect of his paintings because he does all of his with a camera, in order to paint a scene with the utmost accuracy.
In 2005, Yost got the chance to stay a while in Great Falls, Mont., six blocks from Russell's old studio.
"To me it was exciting because it was like RGee, I'm living on the same street," he said.
He said Russell was not the best-known painter, but certainly prolific, painting thousands of pieces and dabbling in sculpture.
Russell had no formal training and neither does Yost, who wants to keep it that way.
In addition to painting, Yost said he would like some day to return to Paraguay, which he said had a profound and lasting effect on him.
"I lived in a little house they made for me with no running water and electricity," he said. "It's the kind of stuff you do when you are camping out ... I'd love to go back there again."
There will be a reception for Yost at the Flickinger Center on Jan. 16 at 5:30 p.m.
Links to Related Topics (Tags):
; Peace Corps Paraguay; Directory of Paraguay RPCVs; Messages and Announcements for Paraguay RPCVs; Art; Painting; New Mexico
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Story Source: Alamogordo Daily News
This story has been posted in the following forums: : Headlines; COS - Paraguay; Art; Painting
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