The first time I met Jeff Tift was shortly after I'd seen his paintings displayed at a local business complex. I was at the complex for a job related workshop and while I don't have a clue what the workshop was about, I vividly remember making my way to each painting hung throughout the lobby. And I think if I had to, I could still remember which painting was on what wall: landscapes and wildlife all with color and perspective that made me feel part of each scene. I learned he lived just up the road from me, so after contacting him I paid him a visit.
When I think of "artists" I often think of adjectives like tortured; dark; mysterious and moody. My mind conjures up reclusive little scotch-swigging hermits muttering to themselves just one brushstroke away from psychosis. Jeff however was perfunctorily normal. After I slipped in the snow and fell on top of his huge black dog, a strapping guy with an easy, almost gregarious manner and a mess of shaggy brown hair met me at the door. He and his wife Kathy, an R.N., are both outdoor sports enthusiasts, and live perched on a steep hillside in a classic-style log home surrounded by the pine trees that come mandatory with every log home. The mountains, valley floor and river sprawl out in front of them like some sort of giant "wish you were here" postcard.
I went for a visit again after calling him about doing a write-up, "Dude, how would you feel about being in my blog?"
"Uh.I don't know."
Rain my Pit Bull and I arrived at the end of their steep and narrow dirt drive and upon opening my car door, Jeff's black Newfoundland dog Thor stuck his enormous, woolly head in and dribbled slobber on me from his floppy jowls. Rain was certain Thor snacked on chocolate-brown Pit Bulls just to keep his blood sugar up, but Thor is a lot like Jeff-happy go lucky-and it didn't take long before she made herself at home peeing in his driveway.
We planted ourselves in a couple of Adirondack chairs on the deck overlooking the valley. Jeff jabbed a pen and notepad at me and said something about taking notes, clearly not used to my laissez-faire "interview" style. A pad and pen were not in my plan and while I was somewhat amused, inwardly I protested...
Alright, I'll do it your way. I went to scribbling in the sun while Hummingbirds buzzed around our heads and Thor intermittently shared his happy-slobber with me.
I really didn't want to ask Jeff the nauseating questions that artists must get asked over and over by fawning aficionados: "I just
love your work, where
do you get your inspiration?" and, "When did you start painting? You're sooo talented. Did you always know you were going to be an artist?" Notepad in hand, I managed to cough up a few basic questions sans the syrupy, rhetorical adulation. He told me when and how he started, why he started, and that he thinks a lot of (but not all) modern art that artsy-types regurgitate their adoration for, is crap. He said that realists are often sniffed at in the art world as somehow less talented. And while he has an enormous appreciation for
good impressionists, he is adamant the good impressionists are good realists first. Meaning as I understood it, one first has to study and accurately paint how things really are in order to convey in impressionism how things might appear to unfettered eyes. But I'm just not that into art, so possibly I didn't get it.
The conversation took on its own shape as we chatted, and in that moment I was freed of the dreaded notepad. These are the conversations that roll easily, where a beer or an iced tea is shared over kitchen-table philosophising. We went from impressionism, to politics and religion. I'm not sure how we got to politics and religion but it had to do with discussing the huge spectrum of residents in this valley and how we all seem to coexist peaceably. Jeff, being as he states, "very liberal" also maintains that in some ways he's "old fashioned" especially when it comes to his long relationship with his wife and expressed consternation that people less and less stick it out in marriage. Jeff is agnostic, and I am a theist. He asked if I had been smoking pot after I talked about the concept and plausibility of eternity, and he said something about he thinks I think too much and then said he didn't like talking about this stuff because he usually scares people off. "Not at all, it shouldn't be" I said, because in my view "politics, philosophies and religion" is at the essence of us all.
No one put Jeff through art school, or paid his way through college and in fact he's never had formal art education. He always dabbled in drawing but in '79 or thereabouts his mom sent him "one of those cheap little paint sets" for Christmas. Majoring in Wildlife Biology because he says, "I didn't know what the hell I wanted to do," that paint set and an understanding wife would ultimately send him on course to where he is now. He says he started looking at artists such as Bateman and thought, 'Sh*t. That'd be a good way to make a living.'
He didn't finish his final year of college because as he put it, "I ran out of money." He dropped out and worked at a mill, of which he said, were insanely fun times due in part to the good weed, although he stopped the weed around 1982 because of the fog it left him in. Then in 1989 after six years of working with his dad at the brickyard, he got tired of loading rock... "I
hated my job." He, like many creative people, doesn't thrive in the tedium of schedules and repetitive tasks. In a moment of realization, he chucked the job to pursue painting full time.
"...dad said,
'...goddam it Jeff. What are you doing?'" Everyone around him thought he'd lost it. Of his wife, Jeff says, "I don't know how she put up with me."
Shortly after ditching the regular job, he entered his work in the Pac-Rim Wildlife Art Show, and one piece, "Lone Wolf," won Best in Show.
Best in show...he chucks it all, and wins Best in Show.
Aside from finding his work listed at his website below, Jeff can be seen speeding up and down the valley with his kayak strapped to the roof and Thor's head sticking out the window.
Go to http://www.jefftift.com/
Below are some of my favorites, but are only a small sampling of Jeff's use of subject matter. Click on any image below to enlarge.
All images used by permission of Jeff Tift.
