About the Artist
I was born in Nashua New Hampshire in November of 1962. And As I look back onto my childhood - I see myself trudging through the snow of my suburban back yard - Equipped with snowshoes, backpack & toy rifle - with my imagination lifting me off to some deep uncharted wilderness.
I had a strong imagination as a boy, and after seeing the movie Jerimaih Johnson at the theater when I was ten, from that day forward I wanted to be a trapper. I continually fantasized about the simplistic and unstructured lifestyles of the mountain men of the old north west. Propelled by my imagination - I would often escape to nearby woodlots to pacify my boyhood dreams by playing mountain man and building makeshift log cabin forts, until the remaining woodlots had succumbed to the city's ever expanding developments. Even as a boy I had sustained a true distaste for city life.
My father would often take me away on weekend excurtions to his remote hunting camp - and there in that wilderness cabin, not only would I learn my own degree of backwoods savvy, but also develop my own profound respect and adoration for wildlife and the immense forests that surrounded us. Since I was too young to participate in the hunting activities, I spent most days in the cabin busy with my sketch pad, transfering my dreams to paper. My woodland experiances became the foundation for my drawings and it soon became evident that I had a gift. My family always provided me with an abundance of art supplies and although I had experimented with countless mediums, I always returned to the simplicity of my pencils. My destiny was found ...I was to be a pencil artist. I spent the rest of my teenage years developing my own distinctive style of pencil drawing. I am completely self-taught.
By 1982 I had a small selection of stationery in print and found myself busy with commissions. I had the potential, but an apartment and a full time job held me back from the life that I wanted to live. In the fall of my twentyfirst year, I found myself standing on the threshold of my dreams. I left the city life behind me and moved to a remote cabin that I had built myself - not far from the hunting camp of my childhood days. My boyhood dreams had begun to materialize and I now possessed the unstructured lifestyle that I truly desired.
I entered my first winter with equal fear and excitement - adventure had replaced routine and I slipped into a life of purpose and necessity. I ran a fulltime trapline, worked a part time job, and my newfound freedom had enabled me to focus, allowing me to tap into a new world of creativity that was unresticted by time and incomprehensible during my previous lifestyle. During the five years in that cabin - my artwork had reached a noticable turning point ... I had become obsessed with detail.
I left that cabin in 1989 to chase my dreams to the north. My adventures took me through Canada, to B.C., the Yukon and Alaska, until I finally settled back into New Hampshire once again and proceeded to build the house of my dreams. By then my artwork had surpassed my own expectations. I had nearly 200 wholesale accounts and numerous "Best in Show" awards to my credit, but success had become a diversion - pulling me away from the quiet contentment that I had worked so hard to obtain. By 2002 I had closed all wholesale accounts and withdrew from most competitions. I needed to regain control of my own creations ... to regain my focus.
On March 30th 2005, my life took an unexpected turn when I lost my home to a horrific fire. My fiance' and I lost all our worldly possesions in a matter of hours and for weeks to follow we lived beneath an overwhelming cloud of devastation, displacement and dissappointment. We didn't have the heart to rebuild, so we picked up the pieces and moved northward once again to my hunting camp in Northern NY State. Together we reconstructed an abandoned Amish farm into a cozy homestead where we currently reside.
All artwork is protected by copyright. No unauthorized reproduction is allowed without written permission from the copyright proprieter - James C. Desclos.