What was the deciding factor to become an artist?

"As a kid drawing was something like an intoxicating experience. I'd go through an entire stack of typing paper drawing the same karate guys over and over again like some kind of unquenchable obsession. My aunt Marilyn was a very skilled portrait sculptor and traditional painter, and she taught me everything I could handle. My mom bought me a few books on drawing and painting the figure in middle school, and soon there was no question that I'd be doing this for the rest of my life."

How were you trained as an artist/ Is there anyone particular that you mentored under?

"School of Visual Arts had a short-lived satellite campus in Savannah, Georgia, and I attended the last three of the four years of its existence. The painting program was intense and most of the week consisted of sitting for long periods of time in front of the model. As a school with very strong figurative tendencies with a tight-knit student body ranging between forty to seventy students, it was as good of an art school experience as you could hope for. Jeff Markowsky was our main painting instructor there, and gave us an excellent foundation in observing color and value. After SVA Savannah closed its doors in 1997 I moved to New York, where Steven Assael was definitely the strongest mentor figure, and I continued to learn from him as a friend after graduation. Prior to working with him I had never imagined the possibility of someone being so prolific and seriously dedicated to his vision, and that changed my life forever. The great thing about Steve is that he is an impossible genius, but without all of the macho attitude that normally goes with it. He's simply a man profoundly in love with painting."

Stephen Cefalo, 'Iconoclast'

What present medium/s do you use to create your artwork/ what is your technique?

"I am a fan of stand oil and am totally obsessed with the properties of flake white. Observing color directly from life is indispensable to me. If I have a technique, it is something like working underneath in transparent browns until I feel I have a grasp on the composition and the drawing, and taking it in a pretty intuitive direction from there. There is usually a good deal of building up, scraping down and reworking in the process."

Is there any specific meaning or conceptual reasons you work in the medium you use?

"To me oil paint itself is the concept, inseparable from the art. I love the feel of it and the history of how it's been used and manipulated by different minds. Painting has as much do with touching as it does with seeing. I tend toward materials that offer the most interesting tactilities."

What contemporary event do you feel most inspires your work?

"Being an eyewitness to the September 11th attacks set into me a feverish sense that I needed to do something meaningful. More recently, the overall sense of political and economic turmoil has definitely contributed to a psychological shift."

) Is your work in any way driven by political events?

"For me it has never worked to try to illustrate sociopolitical ideas in my work. In a culture saturated with propaganda, the last thing I want to make is more of it. If I am driven by these things it is through the total sense of frustration and anxiety that I feel and most of us feel as a result of them, which often works wonderfully, I think."

Would you mind explaining where you are from and how this place has influenced your work?

"I lived in Newburgh, Indiana between the ages of seven and seventeen. Our house was in the "historic" district and I spent most of my time wandering along the riverfront and looming around the art books in the library. I suppose it was the solitude and the wandering more than the place itself that was the real influence."

What kind of emotions /feelings/ questions do you want a viewer to leave your work with?

"Every true aesthetic experience I've had has been tied to a feeling of longing, no matter what for. Anxiety, frustration, confusion, hope, and joy are places the paintings come from, but the canvas is where I can make sense of it all. The great museums are charged with intense emotion, both positive and negative, but I never leave feeling frustration, anxiety, agony, or fear. It is instead a great consolation to know that our struggles are not unlike what people have faced throughout history, and to be caught up in this great thing that is being human is beautiful and empowering. If I could only bring that to people I would be pleased."

How do you feel you break from other representational artwork?

"There is so much great representational painting going on out there, and such a vast history of representation. I simply imitate everything that Intoxicates me about other paintings and combine them in different ways. Every once in a while something powerful results that feels original. I feel like my painting "Iconoclast", is a place where this happens."

What figure and or artist do you feel you are most inspired by?

"Caravaggio is the greatest inspiration, followed by Titian."

How do you develop or come up with the ideas that drive your work?

"The paintings usually begin with some image in my head that keeps coming back to me, usually a melding of life and art history. I am haunted by other paintings, they become part of the way I see things and they eventually find their way into my own work. The painting begins when I start wondering about the image and developing ideas around it. The process of setting up models and objects helps to flesh out the ideas, but at some point, I try to let the painting lead the dance and take itself where it wants to go. Hopefully something I never anticipated will happen and it will take on a personality of its own. To me that's when it becomes a painting."

Stephen Cefalo, 'Mother and Child'

Do you have any specific directions that you either are planning to take or are going to take with your artwork?

"I definitely feel compelled to further develop some of the themes in my current work, but on a much larger scale."

What important advice would you give to your students or a young aspiring artist?

"Don't take it lightly, and don't expect the public to take your work more seriously than you've taken it yourself. Work hard and do something extraordinary."

Would you mind telling us a little more about your exhibition coming up at Ann Nathan Gallery?

"Sure. There will be an opening reception on October 22nd from 5-8 PM, and I'll be attending. It's located at 212 W. Superior St., Chicago, IL. For more information, you can visit www.AnnNathangallery.com or my website at www.StephenCefalo.com