LOU COCO
Lou Coco
Artist
Residence & Studio: 660 West Rd – Richmond MA
Tel: 413-698-3388
E-mail: lpcocojr@yahoo.com
My interest in art started when I was a young boy about 8 years old. I would do oil paintings of objects that I saw in books. I then moved on to painting actual scenes that interested me. I even entered a national drawing contest when I was about 12 years old and received high honors. However, my attention moved off artwork when I entered high school as my parents convinced me that I needed to focus my interests on developing a career in which I could make a decent living. Going to college, fulfilling my military obligation, becoming a husband and father, and completing a 40-year finance career at General Electric & General Dynamics took up most of my free time. I completed little artwork during this period.
Upon my retirement from General Dynamics in 2006 my interest in art resumed greatly like it finally freed itself from a locked box. I joined the Dalton Art Guild, and began doing oil paintings, one after another with a focus on making people, especially children, smile. My mind is consumed with images that come and go daily about scenes that are humorous, folksy, colorful, and unique that a child or young adult would like to have in their room or house. Examples: one day as I was driving with my wife I started to think about animals and how funny it would be if they were dancing to piano music being played by a bear. Another time I pictured a young boy going to baseball tryouts with his three pet dogs following him each carrying a glove, ball or bat in their teeth.
When I got home I started drawing these scenes and completed these paintings that many people have enjoyed by purchasing prints that I had made of them.
I have also completed a few paintings of Berkshire scenes. One of my favorites is that of the dwellings at Hancock Shaker Village.
Upon completion of a painting I have good quality prints made. Some of these prints are then professionally framed or available unframed and displayed for sale at many of the craft fairs that I attend or they are available in my studio at home.