James Naccarato's Bio:

James Naccarato creates a wonderful world of colorful and playful creatures. Naccarato’s figures often have a fictional quality to them, but at the same time his creations feel very natural, organic and possibly preternatural -- perhaps even “real.”

Naccarato was born in Kingston, New York; but has lived most of his life in various parts of California, where he also studied fine art and illustration at the Laguna College of Art and Design. He lives in Long Beach with his wife and two children and has been showing regularly around the country since graduating.

Drawing inspiration from the world around him, Naccarato uses what he sees to infuse his characters with life. He processes information gathered from his daily observations to create his own universe full of twisted and surreal landscapes inhabited with an array of creatures uniquely suited for their particular habitats.

When Naccarato was young, he took a strong interest in 16th and 17th century classical painting, cubism and surrealism. Later, he started to identify with street art, comics and various underground art movements. This marriage of old and new is apparent in his most recent work, which has a very surreal vocabulary and classical technique. Each of his paintings tells a unique story about relationships. Naccarato personifies his creatures with love, loss, solitude, sorrow, ridicule and rebirth. The edges of his images create windows to his worlds, as figures become characters, landscapes become stages and viewers are treated to small and wonderful shows set in these tiny “carnivals.”

Artist Website: www.jamesnaccarato.com

---

Jophen Stein's Bio:

Jophen Stein is a graduate of the Laguna College of Art and Design. After establishing the Snootson Family Showcase in 2004, his distinctive style has gained national recognition over the past couple of years. Despite the minor set backs of being banned from Idaho and Iowa, Jophen Stein continues the SFSC series from his studio in Pomona.

FSC statement:
Jophen Stein’s Snootson Family Showcase is a collection of narrative and character based art. While there are a variety of subjects and motifs presented in the SFSC, a principle underlining theme exists concerning the correlation between antiquity and modernity. With the help of literary devices such as irony and double entendres, the SFSC parodies contemporary social life with the eras and precedence that created it.