Neal
Philpott

Neal Philpott paints the mercurial nature of the West in oil. Originally from Michigan, he studied painting at the Center for Creative Studies in Detroit, and has lived in the Pacific Northwest since 1988. He paints from his studio in Oregon City, Oregon — an hour south of Portland.

Philpott's subject is the Pacific Northwest landscape — forests and streams, the working light of the Columbia Gorge, mountainsides and edges where weather changes the rules. He works as a "preservationist" painter in realism, an artistic witness to the region's environment. He paints places and scenes that may not exist in the future because of environmental change. He does not remove the difficult elements or add prettier ones. "I try to capture how light enlivens these scenes and makes them transcendent for a brief moment," he has said. "I am of the mind that we have precious resources that may disappear. I'm painting for the Northwest."

His work is held in significant public and private collections — the Bureau of Land Management at Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument in Utah, and the personal collection of Governor Jay Inslee on Bainbridge Island, alongside collectors in Oregon, Washington, New York, Salzburg, Indian Springs, and Moscow. He has been featured nine or more times by American Art Collector and several times by Southwest Art — a sustained run of recognition that follows the work.

Philpott was a longtime artist of Roby King Gallery on Bainbridge Island — the legacy program JG Art Gallery acquired and continues — and has shown at Lawrence Gallery (Sheridan, Lake Oswego, and Gleneden Beach, Oregon), Kneeland Gallery (Ketchum, Idaho), Sugarman Peterson Gallery and Peterson-Cody Gallery (Santa Fe), Galerie Belle Ame (Eagle, Idaho), Blue Horse Gallery (Bellingham), and Gallery 903 (Portland).