Faculty Directory
Michael Walter
Art Faculty | Art and Graphic Communications
- 412.676-9885
- mwalter@ccac.edu
- South Campus, B Building B360
- Faculty office hours are available through self-service.
| Degree | Emphasis | Institution |
|---|---|---|
| M.F.A. | Drawing, Painting, Printmaking | Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts |
| Post Bac | Studio Arts | University of Georgia, Athens, GA (Cortona, Italy) |
| B.A. | Studio Arts | University of Pittsburgh |
Biography
Michael Walter is a local artist, educator and administrator with several decades of exhibition history in the Western Pennsylvania region. His plein air landscape paintings and mixed media drawings are in private collections. Mr. Walter also has extensive experience in historical interpretation, having been a professional docent in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia and a coordinator and manager of touristic and educational experiences at the University of Pittsburgh Nationality Rooms.
His instruction focuses on acquisition of material skills and knowledge of one's drawing and painting tools and expressive capabilities. Using a gamut of creative approaches to create critically aware and personally meaningful communication is his aim in teaching and encouraging young artists and in his own art. Themes in his art involve history and personal movement through that, time, geology. Landscapes eschew the human element and accentuate nature and color.
In his spare time, he enjoys classical music and some alternative music, hiking, state parks, and iced tea.
Invited to study at The Barnes Foundation (original, Merion, PA) in the Violette de Mazia lectures on interconnected understanding of art and aesthetics.
Placement and honorable mention awards for art shown in group exhibitions.
Past memberships in the Pittsburgh Society of Artists, Pittsburgh Print Group, Associated Artists of Pittsburgh and current member of the Greensburg Art Center.
I believe every student has a creative, expressive desire and to help them reveal that and find that their work and the imagination behind has value is rewarding to me. And there is the happiness that comes from sharing knowledge, sometimes esoteric (like medieval metalpoint drawing) or experimental (graphite Vaseline drawing or rubbed texture collage drawing)--the aim has been understand limitations in materials and discover which ones work best for the expression the individual artist wants.
I have sketched and painted in unusual places and circumstances: hunkering down behind French middle schoolers to draw a lot of the Sistine Chapel ceiling; painting in a snowstorm beside a creek; painting in the desert in West Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and Baja California.
"Nobody knows their former shapes" — Steve Kilbey