Darren Terpstra

Darren Terpstra is a native of Minnesota where he received his education in visual communication at St. Cloud State University. He's been working professionally in the corporate and academic world of art and design for many years, but has recently gone back to his roots creating his own fine art. His work combines painting, collage, and photography in both acrylic and hot beeswax mediums. He is drawn to the mechanism of collage to story-tell, which pares well with his passion for vintage images; illustrations, maps, letters, engravings, lithographs, and woodcuts that have been lost to the world, sequestered away in rare books and documents. These things are an inspiration to him in their beauty and aesthetic contributions to society, regardless of their practical or functional purpose, and they provide wonderful symbolism and abstraction for his work. Darren also photographs the world around him, not just images of natural beauty, but of patterns, patinas, textures and commentary on our times, mixing those images into his art as well. Darren has honed a foundation in conceptualizing and developing strong imagery and narrative in his work, whether literal or abstract, featuring looks that have a rich, multilayered, and textural appearance, with notions of wonder or magic. This draws the viewer in on a surface level, and invites them to spend time observing the greater depth revealed upon closer inspection.