Richard Estes is a photorealist painter famed for his meticulous attention to detail and invisible brushwork. He was born in Kewanee, Illinois, on May 14, 1932, but moved to Chicago with his family at a young age. From 1952 to 1956, Estes studied fine art at the Art Institute of Chicago, where he was exposed to early realist artists such as Edgar Degas and Thomas Eakins. He relocated to New York after graduating and worked for the next 10 years as a commercial artist for various publishers in New York and Spain. By 1966, the artist had saved up enough money to paint full time.
In the 1960s, Estes and his contemporaries, including painter Chuck Close and sculptor Duane Hanson, helped photorealism emerge from modern art movements such as pop art and minimalism.
His paintings are reproductions of photographs he takes of urban landscapes, most of which are realistic representations of Manhattan, with few to no people on the streets and sidewalks. He often exaggerates the detail in his imagery by using mirrored objects and reflections. Double Self-portrait (1976), one of his most well-known works, is a great example of how he uses reflection to expand the depth of an image.
In 1971, Estes was granted a fellowship with the National Council for the Arts. During the 1970s, he was chosen three times to represent the United States at the Bienniales in Venice and Basel. He also received the MECA Award for Achievement as a Visual Artist from Maine College of Art. In the 1980s, Estes began painting landscapes of Chicago, Paris, Florence, and other cities he visited. The artist went on to create a series of seascapes in the 1990s, which mainly consisted of representations of the coast of Maine where he lives and works when not in New York.
