Tom Talbot

1936, Broken Bow, Nebraska – 2009, Chicago, Illinois

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Tom Talbot, a fourth generation Nebraskan, was born in 1936 in Broken Bow, Nebraska, on the eastern edge of the Nebraska Sandhills. Formative years were spent in the area which his forebears had helped to settle in the late 1870s and 1880s. The family background merged practicality with sensitivity, and stability with a love of adventure. Travel as a child opened doors to other worlds and fostered curiosity.

Talbot was twelve when his first set of oils was ordered from a mail order house and, with no instruction, he set about using those tools of expression. Formal training began the following year with a short summer session at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Inspired by Manfred Keiler, an artist from Germany with European academic training, Talbot returned for four summers to study with Keiler. After graduation from Broken Bow High School and a short time at the University of Nebraska, Talbot attended the American Academy of Art in Chicago, Illinois, graduating in 1958.

Several years were spent as a commercial artist in Chicago; Lincoln, Nebraska; and Denver, Colorado; with experience in publishing, newspapers, and advertising agencies. Disillusioned with this life, Talbot turned to painting as a profession in 1963 and started portraying his world of places and people.

Beginning in 1963, he intermittently taught art to several hundred people in more than a dozen communities throughout central Nebraska, and was founder of the Autumn Art Workshop in Nebraska’s National Forest at Halsey.

Talbot and his wife, Ginger, traveled extensively and his style of painting varied with the subject portrayed and the emotion expressed. The places they visited in the United States, Europe, and Mexico are often seen in his work.

Talbot was represented by galleries in Lubbock, Texas; San Francisco, California; Denver, Colorado; and Ogunquit, Maine; and his work is in many private collections throughout the United States and several foreign countries. His murals are seen in Nebraska banks, hospitals, and hotels.

In 2009, he died of cancer in Chicago where he and his wife lived.

2012

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Bloodline, Tom Talbot, alkyd on canvas, n.d.