Russell Ricks

Russell Ricks Biography
Artist Russell Ricks, is a second generation artist from the Don Ricks family. Raised in Rexburg, Idaho, Russell grew up in a creative environment surrounded by art every day. It all began as a young child watching his father Don Ricks painting and teaching art in his studio, producing artwork to sell through galleries and painting signs for his commercial clients. At the age of eight, Russell had already determined he would become a professional artist. One day in the barber chair getting his hair cut, his barber asked what his name was. He responded with, "My name is Russell Ricks and I'm an artist!" Ricks says the barber still would tease him about it to this day.By about 1969, when Russell was nine years old, his father founded a national plein air (painting outdoors in the open air) school he called, Painting Vacations. Two nationally renown art instructors; Sergei Bongart, a Russian native and noted Soviet artist (originally from Kiev, Ukraine); and Milford Zornes, a water colorist from Southern Utah, taught in the school along with Russell's father. The nationally advertised school was in operation for about 15 years, bringing a solid instructional foundation to thousands of artists including Russell.For the past 30+ years, Russell's work has been collected and sold throughout the United States and Canada. Some of his clients have included the Monsanto Corp., Alco, Inc., Novatek International, BYU- Idaho and commissions for private clients homes or businesses.
Some of his noteworthy commissions he is well known for also include another type of genre ---his gargantuan-sized interior landscape murals in corporate settings ---Cabela’s; Alcoa, Inc and Novatek, Inc., to name a few. Back in June of 2006, Russell invited former Springville Museum curator, Vern Swanson to witness the finished product of one of his Novatek murals in person. As a result, Mr. Swanson invited Russell to hang his artwork in a One Man Show at the Springville Museum of Art, which hung from September 9 to November 1, 2015. From November 2016 through the month of 2017, Russell's painting titled "Farm Workers in a Lavender Field" was accepted into the Oil Painter's of America Western Regional Show in Saint George, Utah. His most recent mural was painted in the summer of 2019 for Young Living Essential Oils, honoring the late Founder D. Gary Young, measuring 13 feet by 25 feet 

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