 To much of the art we experience and most of the artists we come to know, we feel obliged to apply labels. Descriptive nouns such as expressionism, realism or cubism help us to fix an artist's work in time, or to distinguish one body of work from others. Such appellations aren't of much use when considering the work of Jim Karlovich. While these and other descriptors have applied and do apply to his work at various points in time, his employment of different or combined media and the ease with which his focus shifts from one method of execution or mode of interpretation to another makes it very difficult to classify or categorize his work.
What Karlovich regards as his only (semi) formal art education came after graduating college during the time he spent in Italy as a Navy carrier pilot. "I was immersed in a land and culture that gave us so much of what we consider the world's greatest art. Inspiration surrounded me. I had to paint." At that time it wasn't uncommon to find a painting in progress carefully wedged somewhere in his plane to protect it from the jarring force of carrier landings or catapult takeoffs. For a number of years after that, his painting and then sculpting increasingly competed for time and attention with his roles as COO or CEO of professional service firms but finally won out.
Since the beginning of 2006, Karlovich has been painting and sculpting full time. Of the transition he says, "There really was no decision to be made. I had contained the need to create for years, trying to fit it in whenever I could. I needed more time to explore, to experiment, to let my painting and sculpting happen." Liberated from the demands of his professional life, the intensity and energy he brought to it are now applied to his painting and sculpture. He is developing new themes and ideas, and exploring new mediums, exposing his paintings and sculptures to an ever expanding audience along the way. His work can be found in private and corporate collections throughout the United States and Europe |
