
Pavel Kapic was born and raised in Czechoslovakia. He initially
studied management and applied science at the Czech Polytechnic
University in Prague. In
1968, after a brief teaching career at the university and
the short-lived Prague Spring, Kapic fled his homeland.
After months of uncertainty, he was among the first Czechs
to board a Pan Am flight bound for New York and new life.
Thus began Kapic's journey of reinvention.
With
his academic training, Kapic was soon hired as a management
consultant, while he also attended Columbia University,
earning a Master’s Degree. Despite a demanding schedule,
he concurrently pursued his passion for art and attended
fine arts classes at The Parsons School of Design in New
York City.
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In the summer of 1974, he traveled for a work-study program
to Pietrasanta, a historical town in Tuscany. There, he
was exposed to stone-carving in the marble yards that had
been home to the great sculptors, dating back to Michelangelo.
Surrounded by a century-old, stone-carving tradition and
encouraged by his Italian mentors, Kapic focused on sculpture.
He returned twice to Pietrasanta, where he apprenticed as
a carver. It was at this point that he turned his attention
full time to his art.
After
returning to New York, he focused on painting at The Art
Students League, this time studying color and composition
in a two-dimensional space. One of his instructors remarked,
"Kapic’s paintings reach deeply into the many
colorful layers of his memory in an extraordinarily unique
manner. "
Over
the years Kapic has worked in tempera, watercolor and other
media, but his prefered milieu has been oil painting. His
style can best be described as romantic expressionism; with
bold strokes of washes of complementary colors he adds vivid
life to his subjects. His textural use of gesso - paint
forming fresco-like surfaces - also builds added dimension
and reflects Kapic’s early training as a sculptor.
Art lovers across Europe and the United States now collect
Kapic’s work. In recent years his paintings have been
exhibited in galleries in Italy, France, the Czech Republic,
New York City; Sarasota, Florida; Santa Fe, New Mexico and
Newport Beach, California.
In
2003, Kapic realized one of his dreams. He and his wife
Alyssia Lazin,
an established art photographer, moved full time to their
340-year-old restored farmhouse outside Lucca, Italy. When
not traveling or painting, he works in his olive orchard
and perfects his culinary skills with the produce from their
prized vegetable garden.
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Curriculum Vitae |