William DeBilzan

Biography

William DeBilzan began his unique journey on February 27, 1956 in Amarillo, Texas. As a youth growing up in Grass Lake, Michigan, DeBilzan would, for many years, only dabble in art related arenas, instead directing his energies into sports and other projects. It took years for this California Abstract Expressionist to embrace the inevitable.

These days, DeBilzan would consider an eight-hour session of painting, play personified and just about half his "working day." Exceptional galleries and active collectors, both domestically and abroad, fully reinforce this artist's playful obsession and massive number of logged studio hours.

Between 1980 and 1999, DeBilzan made his home in Southern California where fellow artists, mentors, friends and a colorful coastal haven would prove inspirational. Artistic projects escalated dramatically in the late 80's and early 90's in Laguna Beach. It was in Laguna that local galleries and private collectors first began representing and collecting his figurative and purely abstract bodies of work.

A New Millennium brought with it an invitation and perhaps the single greatest artistic and production challenge for DeBilzan. A series of eight enormous 7 x 14 foot paintings, based on his interpretation of Vivaldi's famous concertos, The Four Seasons, would earn him enormous press and critical attention in 2000. This Millennium Project, by invitation of the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra, was hung in Pope Joy Hall in Albuquerque and simultaneously viewed during all the N.M.S.O. performances of The Four Seasons.

Happily remarried, William DeBilzan is the proud father of three teenage boys and a baby girl. Between marathon painting sessions in his massive new Santa Fe studio, he can often be found on a plane headed to yet another opening.

“Painting for me is like play intensified, though still a kind of therapeutic journey…a place I can lose and find myself simultaneously. My paintings are personal until they become complete. I enjoy it when my finished worked serves as a vehicle for interpretation, imagination and discussion. To this end, I find the pieces I struggle over most, usually my best efforts.”