Meet Jonathan Lopez | Artist

We had the good fortune of connecting with Jonathan Lopez and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Jonathan, what is the most important factor behind your success?
I think one of the most important factors is staying committed to your craft. Being motivated to continue to inspire through my artwork as well as pushing my personal limits and boundaries of what can be done through my art. I believe another successful factor is to simply network and meet other artists or people that share that same passion and want to see you succeed and surrounding yourself with positive people.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
Well I’ve been drawing and creating art my whole life. I started drawing at a young age, since kindergarten. As I got into my teenage years I began to get into Graffiti Art. During that period I learned alot about color and painting on walls. Learning knew techniques. During high-school is when I was introduced to traditional painting. I learned a majority of my skills through taking 4 years of advanced art classes. Developing a style that is more contemporary realism with hints of surrealism, that also has graffiti influences. Then I began showcasing my work in galleries and different venues in the central valley, California. Further developing my skills as a Muralist as well. Painting several murals during that time and still learning as I go. I think the hardest part to becoming a known artist is just consistently try to stay focused and come up with new and refreshing things that will captivate an audience. I think one of the lessons I learned throughout the process is to not get discouraged by the lack of attention or lack of support. I think as long as you stay true to yourself and stay motivated and continue to display your talent I think the cream always rises to the top. What I look forward to in the future is to simply paint and to give myself more opportunities. I have so many ideas and paintings in my mind I need to get out and produce, I feel I’m still getting better with each piece I do. Hopefully the more I do the more recognition I get, but more importantly the more art is thrown onto the world and hopefully during that time I can continue to inspire others in my community as well. At the end of the day, I want people to see beauty and meaning in my artwork. I want them to see a story and connect with the art as opposed to just seeing pretty colors on a canvas.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
I’m from Fresno, California. One of the favorite events here is Arthop, which is a dedicated “Art Walk” where the entire downtown area and galleries open up to the public to showcase art from all over the central valley. With live music and food vendors, restaurants and activities for everyone to enjoy. It’s a night where artist can mingle with the public and people can walk the entire downtown area and enjoy themselves. With plenty of Breweries in the area like Tioga Sequoia, Full Circle Brewing, it’s definitely a good time.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
I’d definitely like to shout out my wife Andrea Perez, she’s always been a supporter of mine. She’s been someone I can confide in on any topic regarding my artwork and has always been extremely helpful in all aspects from creating art to the business side of things to just simply being my moral support. I’d also like to take the time to thank my high-school art teacher Matt Marheinke whom originally got me interested in traditional painting and the gallery scene here in my hometown. If it wasn’t for him I might not be painting at all. The amount of knowledge I learned from him at such an early age was invaluable to my art career.

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