STEVE PENLEY BUILT A CAREER CREATING HIS VERSIONS OF ICONIC IMAGES!
Rather than throwing himself with passion and determination into the art world, Buckhead resident Steve Penley says his career has been more about art coming after him.
“Somebody—probably my mom —told me I was a great artist, and I believed it,” says Penley, who grew up in Macon. “But looking back, I don’t know if I was that good.”
Becoming an art major at the University of Georgia in the 1980s was a bit unexpected, he says. “I couldn’t even believe they had painting and drawing as a major; I thought it was so easy,” he says. “In my first class, I got the coldest stares. I walked in dressed like a little preppy kid from Macon and found all these grunge, hippie people. I quickly learned the most ruthless social hierarchy was the art department; it was a very competitive environment.”
After UGA, Penley headed to New York, but painting wasn’t a priority.
“I was selling women’s shoes because I thought it was a great way to meet girls—it wasn’t,” he says. “And it was exhausting, getting to work, going out at night, starting over again. I lived in such a small space that there wasn’t a lot of room to paint. But I was just too lazy; I think I got one painting done the whole time I was there.”
After running out of money, Penley headed to Atlanta in 1992 with what he describes as “no marketable skills.” But a college buddy who was opening an Italian restaurant in Midtown got him back to the easel.
“He wanted 10 to 15 paintings of historical icons super-fast, and he gave me the money to buy the supplies,” Penley says. “After that, a lawyer at King & Spalding wanted me to paint the firm’s founders. That was my first real painting commission in Atlanta, and it snowballed from there.”
Those opportunities fed Penley’s penchant for painting iconic faces and objects in acrylics: the American flag, Winston Churchill, Marilyn Monroe, the Statue of Liberty. He also ventures into landscapes and florals, but his contemporary take on readily-identifiable images has solidified his reputation.
“Especially outside of Georgia, I’m known for these political icons, but I’m not political,” he says. “I go for subjects that are bigger than themselves. The perfect example is George Washington. We all have this idea of who he is from seeing his image on the dollar bill. But we’re seeing a symbol, not an individual person. Same for JFK or Ronald Reagan. Regardless of politics, they encompassed ideals bigger than themselves, and they became mega-icons, bigger than life. I try to put my own spin on that.”
Inspired by artist Andy Warhol, Penley often puts that spin onto oversized canvases, some as large as 40-by-40 feet. His biggest was for the Beijing Olympics that soared 8 feet high and stretched 65 feet across. His gallery, in a renovated space next to The St. Regis Atlanta, showcases smaller works, including posters and reproductions on paper or canvas, priced from $125 to more than $5,000. Penley credits Atlanta’s spirit and entrepreneurial climate with much of his success. “I think what I do couldn’t have happened in a lot of other places; this is the perfect environment for me,” he says. “And frankly, if it were easier to make money selling refrigerators, I’d probably do that. You have to be a little bit delusional to make it in art.”
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PHOTO: Erik Meadows
