We are thrilled to announce that one of our most acclaimed Portraits, Inc. artists is featured in the January/February 2013 issue of The Artist’s Magazine.
Everett Raymond Kinstler got his start with portraiture when he signed on with us around 50 years ago. Today, he works from his Gramercy Park studio at the historic National Arts Club in Manhattan. In this space, Kinstler has painted more than 2,000 portraits, including those of Tony Bennett, Katharine Hepburn, Tom Wolfe, more than 50 U.S. Cabinet members and seven U.S. presidents.
The article describes Kinstler’s studio in great detail noting the paintings, sketches and photographs that are scattered all over and says “every nook and cranny holds some treasure and an opportunity for a personal anecdote.” It includes insight into what it was like to work with high profile subjects, such as Katharine Hepburn.
When he dropped out of school at 16 to take a job drawing comic book illustrations and paperback book covers, he probably never expected to work with people like Hepburn. But throughout his first years in the art industry, he discovered that painting people was what he enjoyed the most. He easily made the transition to portraiture and signed on with Portraits, Inc. He quickly established himself as one of America’s top portrait painters.
Most of the time, Kinstler works only from life, rather than photographs, feeling a responsibility to capture both the likeness and the spirit of his subjects. He prefers his sitters to be animated rather than motionless, so he often carries on lively conversations while painting.
Even if his methods are a little out of the ordinary, what Kinstler does works. His paintings are included in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Brooklyn Museum and the Butler Institute of American Art, among others. The Smithsonian Portrait Gallery has acquired more than 100 of his paintings.
To read the entire article and learn more about Kinstler, see pages 56-63 in the January/February 2013 issue of the Artist’s Magazine.
Self-portrait by Everett Raymond Kinstler, 1993. Copyright Everett Raymond Kinstler