Collection: Nobuo Watanabe Artist Biography and Art Gallery Collection

Nobuo Watanabe was born in Japan in 1937. Educated there in Japan, he graduated college with a degree in Communications. As a result of his initial choice of a career in the television industry, he was sent to the United States to study our production techniques. This experience ultimately led to his decision to relocate to San Francisco in 1972. and he settled in near by Daly City, California. Nobuo Watanabe, schooled himself in everything American. He traveled frequently to the East Coast to explore the towns and back roads of New England, spent hours in the Grandma Moses museum in Vermont and immersed himself in country music. It was here that Nobuo Watanabe began painting.

Because of Nobuo Watanabe's outstanding use of color and unique ability to instill joy in those who viewed his work, his original paintings quickly sold through prestigious galleries in northern California and Hawaii. A master of detail, Watanabe applies a meticulous definition to every face, tree, and snowflake. Using his technique of precisionism, the humor and playfulness evidenced by his work scenes are so charming that the viewer should be prepared for a long, long look, in order to fully observe all the elements that he has included. Watanabe, being greatly influenced by trips to New England, depicts the trains and bridges, churches and silos that he found in the picturesque small towns dotting the countryside. This subject matter creates a delightful adjunct to his style which incorporates within it the subtle influence of his boyhood in Japan. His clouds often sail across the sky like an oriental brush stroke, with kites dancing freely above the hillside.

Despite the obvious appeal of Nobuo Watanabe's choice of subject matter, the depth of this artist's skill should be not be missed because of the allure of his images. As each detail is observed, his work earns respect and admiration, in addition to the appreciation that it generates at first glance. All of his nostalgic scenes are such outstanding tributes to the greatness of this country that San Francisco Mayor Art Agnos declared September 16th, 1999 "Watanabe Day," and the White House selected him to design and paint the Easter Eggs used in its annual Easter Egg Roll in 1989 and 1991. All of his works hold within them a world of fascination for old and young, rich and poor, sophisticated and plain.

Nobuo Watanabe's limited edition serigraphs have launched him on the road which has led him to enormous success in the art world today. This can be attributed to the fact that seeing a "Watanabe" is like seeing a small part of Americana, rendered with the craftsmanship, ingenuity, and intelligence of an immensely gifted artist. Children skip through the street in front of a small town's general store, bakery and barbershop. Fireworks burst in the sky above a Fourth of July parade. Children play among jack-o'-lanterns in a haunted mansion. This Americana, captured in such depth and detail that it is now included in the permanent collections of the White House and Smithsonian,