Jim Jordan
My dad was an illustrator so I was around fine and commercial art all my life. I must have absorbed some of the ethos as I was growing up. Aside from some dabbling, it wasn’t until I was in my twenties that I began my formal training in art and design at the Philadelphia College of Art (now known as the University of the Arts) where I graduated in 1962 with a Bachelor of Science in Industrial Design.
My professional career included working in several corporations such as Westinghouse, Digital Equipment and Corning Glass and design consultancies such as Walter Landor as a designer and design manager. I also taught at Hong Kong Polytechnic as a principal lecturer. A few years after graduation from PCA I earned an MBA at Boston University.
Over the course of the succeeding years, five children and three grandchildren entered my life. Those events are among my most significant accomplishments.
The undergraduate years also included (in addition to design) classes in painting, drawing, and sculpture. While I didn’t focus on the fine arts after graduation, I did spend some time with them.
Years later, when I retired from design I decided to spend some serious time working on my fine art skills. The Bay Area has some very fine schools and professional artists and so I took advantage of the relatively low cost community college art department offerings. The schools included Laney, Merritt, Berkeley City, Alameda and Las Positas.
A major portion of my continuing art education was gained by attending many classes at DVC such as ceramics, sculpture, drawing, painting, anatomy, Photoshop, Illustrator, cartooning, computer animation, and many more. While there, I earned two certificates: painting/drawing and ceramics.
Aside from the joy of making art, One of the benefits of post graduate training and practice are the many wonderful artists I have met. The opportunity to learn from, socialize with and create among them has been invaluable.
At Studio 55, I have found the most salubrious of venues. For the first time in a long time, I have found a purpose built studio with all the amenities that I could ask for; I no longer have to adapt my living space to work on a project then convert it back to eat dinner. Most importantly, there are a group of serious artists with whom to share the joy. This communal benefit is particularly important during the time of the coronavirus. There are few enough people so that the possibility for contamination is minimal as long as precautions are observed but there are enough people so that I don’t feel as though I am totally isolated.
Jim Jordane: jimjordan38@gmail.com
w: jimjordan-art.com and jimjordan4arts.com
