Brad Aldridge
Brad Aldridge Contemporary landscape painter Brad Aldridge was born in Japan in 1965. His father's service in the military took the family from Japan to several locations in the US. Aldridge earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree at Brigham Young University in Utah, a professional printer certification at Tamarind Institute of Lithography in New Mexico, and a Master of Fine Arts degree from the University of Arkansas.
Aldridge paints pictures that range from epic to intimate, each evoking an idyllic calm and each imbued with his hopeful vision of the world. He and his wife carefully handcraft each frame on his pictures.
Brad Aldridge’s paintings have been featured in many group exhibitions and over twenty-five solo exhibitions. His paintings are represented in private and public collections on five continents including monumental murals in temples for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Japan, Peru, and several locations throughout the United States.
ARTIST STATEMENT
Art needs a reason to exist. That’s what a college professor once told me, and I think it’s true. Painting is communication when shared with others, and when one communicates, they should have a point. Intimate conversations should convey something that is worth saying. Ideally, they share a glimpse into precisely who the person really is, what they really think and feel.
When I communicate, when I paint the world around me, my best paintings are suffused with my temperament and sensibilities, my views on the big questions of existence. The world in which I find myself is often filled with hard adversity in an uncertain tangled present, to be sure. But often in nature, I am surprised by some exquisite scene, the profile of a tree against a pale blue sky, the last red light of day on the west mountains near my home, or a glowing distant horizon. These moments remind me of a hopeful something, "a far off country," “a better country.” I want my paintings to echo what nature teaches so well, that dawn follows the darkest night, and that in spite of a long hard winter, spring comes again.