Dale D Ziemianski : My BioI was first introduced to true Fantasy when I was in High School, where I was assigned The Lord of the Rings Trilogy to read. I found that I just couldn't put them down. At the same time, I was just getting into hiking, camping and backpacking....mostly in the Hocking Hills State Park region in Southern Ohio, where I now live. The two melded together in those impressionable years when my interests in art were becoming more focused. The gorgeous rock formations and waterfalls, massive trees and lush forests that I camped in filled my imagination with LOTR tales and made me feel like I was living them in every magical hollow I explored. The following years, camping was becoming a religion to me. Whenever I felt I'd become lost in the complexities of life, I'd lay out on an outcrop of sandstone, look up at the stars (you can easily see the Milky Way out there) and try to imagine myself, rather than lying on the ground looking up, I'd picture myself stuck to the side of a huge planet, looking outwards. I'd imagine that the stars in front of me were not above me, but ahead of me, and when I felt like I could fall off the side of this giant ball into the stars, when I got that flutter in my stomach that you get when you're at the top of a roller coaster, that's when I'd reach that clarity of mind that shows me where I really am in this universe...stuck to the side of an insignificant rock flying through space. Once I reached that state of mind, no problem was too big to handle. Spending this time in the woods taught me to pay attention not only to the ecosystem, but to how everything grew there. I'd see a huge moss-covered rock with a crack in it created by a 50ft pine tree growing on top of it. I'd see weathered sandstone with intricat patterns of wind and water erosion. Occasionally I'd run across an old decayed log cabin overgrown with plantlife. All these things started to sink in and I started using the concept in my artwork, building scenes so they looked like they evolved there themselves. Rather than sticking a subject in a random scene, I'd imagine how the landscape would influence what someone would wear or what kind of animal would evolve there. This line of thinking led to my next obsession.....science.
I went through a few years of reading everything I could about evolution.... evolution of the universe, the solar system, our planet, life on the planet, man, society and civilization. I read everything I could get my hands on and watched every nature program I could find. Everything just started to come together, from how DNA replicates to space-time to human nature. Science now became my new religion. Throughout all my reading, I wondered whether all these scientists actually looked at what they were studying and whether they actually applied this knowledge to their daily life, or if they studied science as if it were happening in a book. I started disassembling my way of thinking and reassembling it based on all the new knowledge I had of how the brain evolved and worked, how humans survived the ice ages, how our behavior, my behavior, is the direct result of how we evolved. I even began applying that to my art. from simple things like ... using blue hues in lighter shadows to make things look farther away because the air contains water vapor, and the farther away the object, the more droplets there are between me and the object, so the more those droplets reflect the blue sky, but that reflection can only be seen when it's in front of something darker than the droplets, (the reason we can't see outside through a window unless it's lighter outside than it is inside, or we only see our reflection) hence, the color of the blue sky showing in front of the shadows in the distance. Simple deductions like this help to understand how to create worlds that are believable. Other methods include, for example, my painting, Seeder (to your right). Combining the cornlike plantlife with an alien that curiously resembles ancient Mayan caricatures, giving him a tribal native squatting pose all denotes ancient wisdom. coupled with the planet, stars, bubble-like spheres and the green energy bust emanating from the beings finger suggesting science fiction, even though no technbology is present, gives a feeling of being in th future and being more advanced than humans on earth, and yet another common belief in the UFO community that aliens often visited Central America ... all three of these aspects come into play in this painting to bring the past, present and future together to create a timeless wisdom that makes this being nearly godlike, yet simple in his purpose. The little pods growing close to where he's pointing, then growing taller as they are farther away, is a technique that triggers common logic to suggest that he is the one planting them. A thorough understanding of how our minds work can create much more in a painting than meets the eye. So that's where my head's at! That's how I see and live life on a daily basis. No TV, learn all you can about the world and what makes us tick ... and more importantly ... USING that knowledge to make my life better in every way. I eat natural food when I'm home so I can eat pizza and cookies when I'm out with family and friends. I go hiking at least once a week so I can sit on my butt in my pajamas and paint on my computer all day to pay bills. And I keep learning, as is human nature (when it's not bombarded with commercials and sports).
I've been learning digital painting the last couple years. Occasionally I combine it with 3D rendering programs when I feel it does a better job. I've done away with the paints now unless it's specifically commissioned. It's too much like painting with crayons. I just can't get the detail I need with it. I keep learning, applying the new knowledge I obtain, the new techniques I learn about the various painting programs and 3D rending tools I've added some blog pages (just recently) where I'll babble even more than I did on this page...mostly about thoughts, and stuff that happens that I want to babble about, and I'm starting an Art Blog where I share some of the things I've learned about painting, drawing, seeing, digital illustation, and what I've learned about the business side of art over the years. If you're an artist, check it out. I'm also writing my own style of Jazz Fusion, I call Techno-Tribal Jazz. Listen to some of it while you're browsing my website...especially Witchdoctor's Daughter. That one's awesome.
If you're into Astrology, check out my
I opened a couple MySpaces, too.
This one's my more personal Myspace.
I work on my computer daily and often leave the page open once I swing by and check on my buds, so leave a comment and say 'hi'.
This is my Music Myspace, where you can buy some of my jams if you like 'em.
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