When Don Hill was twelve years old he decided he wanted to be a landscape painter. But after two years in art school in his native Nashville, he joined the Marines and was sent to fight in Vietnam. Like many of the young men of his generation he was permanently scarred by the experience, but unlike many others he managed to make a life with his family and a successful career as a graphic designer. Since his retirement in 2012 he has returned to his landscape painting. He has an exhibition of fourteen of his paintings hanging in Reflections Gallery on Lee Highway.
Artist Statement
My paintings are about felling, when I start a painting either in studio or plein air I
I want the viewer to feel the moment that is on the canvas.
Every painting that I finish I’m amazed that this painting evolved from within with a combination of impressionism and realism and mood.
Artist History
Don grew up in Sweetwater Tennessee as a boy, he would copy paintings on the cover of outdoor life and studied art from Art Instruction school and that inspired his interest in art. After high school he attended Harris School of Art and studied painting and drawing for two years. After two years in the Marine Corp and a tour in Vietnam he attended Art Institute of Pittsburgh and majored in fine art painting and design.
He started is art career in Nashville with studio six as an Illustrator and Designer.
He moved to Chattanooga with his family in 1974 and started an art studio named Nova Graphic and tought art classes at Chattanooga State.
In 1978 he went to work with McKee Foods as a package designer and worked there for 34 years and retired in 2012. After his wife passed away that year he picked up his paints and started working on his first love of art which is landscape painting.
I want the viewer that sees my paintings to feel that place and see themselves there and feel the mood of that moment.
