About Kevin Tolman
Born in Detroit, Michigan in 1949, Kevin Tolman attended classes at the Detroit Institute of Arts and Cass Tech as a youth, and he is a graduate of the Art School of the Society of Arts and Crafts, in Detroit. In 1981 he moved to the Ramah Navajo Reservation in western New Mexico. Feeling at home in the Southwest, he later settled in a north valley area of Albuquerque, building an adobe house and studio in 1987. In 1990 he spent a year painting in Arraiolos, a small hill town in central Portugal, and in the years since he has continued to work when traveling in Europe, Mexico, and most recently, South America.
For over four decades, Kevin Tolman has been exhibiting his work in galleries, museums, and universities across the United States, where his paintings are included in numerous private, corporate, and public collections. His work has also been exhibited internationally in Canada, Mexico, Germany, France, England, and Portugal. A Tolman canvas is included in the Albuquerque Museum’s permanent collection, and his work now hangs in the collections of the New Mexico State Capitol, and the University of New Mexico.
Tolman works in a variety of mediums including drawing in pencil and caran d’ache, and painting with acrylic, collage and mixed medias on canvas or paper. These are abstract works primarily influenced by the natural world and much informed by a sense of place. He does no preparatory drawings prior to starting a painting. These works are created slowly in layer after layer, and it is by taking risks and paying attention to the chance circumstances that arise during this process that each piece is allowed to reveal it’s individual direction and character. The artist can often be found working under the trees at a large easel next to his studio near the Rio Grande.