Gallery With A Cause • Located in the New Mexico Cancer Center • Benefitting the NMCC Foundation
Please call gallery director Regina Held to arrange a private gallery tour, make a purchase, or ask any questions.
Biography
Tom attended Northern Arizona University, where he received a BFA degree in studio painting in 1981. Soon after graduating, his paintings were exhibited by the Westside/Magadini Gallery in Phoenix. There he was part of a group show, and his paintings received a favorable write up in the Phoenix Gazette. He also entered various juried shows and won awards for his colored pencil drawings. In the early 1990s, his artwork was represented by Wolfwalker Gallery in Sedona, where his watercolor landscapes were well received. His paintings sometimes sold within minutes of delivery to the gallery.
In 1994, Tom took a hiatus from his fine art career to attend graduate school in journalism at the University of Oregon, followed by work as a researcher at Project Vote Smart, a national non-profit voter information group based in Corvallis, OR. During those years, he sustained his interest in art by working as a freelance illustrator and designing editorial art for news and arts magazines. In 2000, Tom began an eight-year stint as a travel editor at the Daily News-Sun in Sun City, Arizona, where he used his artistic skills to design and illustrate features stories.
Blazier returned to his first love, oil painting, in 2008, pursuing landscape themes inspired by the American Southwest full time. He divides his time between outdoor studies and studio work at his home in Albuquerque, where he lives with his wife, Suzanne. His paintings are represented by Legends of the West in Santa Fe, New Mexico and Big Horn Gallery in Tubac, Arizona.
In addition to his full-time painting, Tom teaches oil landscape painting classes and workshops in Albuquerque and other locations in the Southwest.
Artist Statement
Drama, mood and atmosphere are what take center stage in my oil landscape paintings. Skies, the source of light, are an important component of my work, either as the primary subject or an indirect player in setting the emotional and visual tone for the subject. Having lived in both dry and wet climates, I am sensitive to how different environments affect light quality. I seek to convey and enhance subtle nuances of mood through careful observation and skillful application of paint. The result is often luminous and ethereal. At other times contrasts are bold and dramatic. Whether the subject is a towering cumulus above a high desert expanse, or the yellow glow cast on rocky cliffs at sunset, my paintings are an expression of the breathtaking beauty of the Southwest landscape.
