Nick Pugh
Nick Pugh (born January 15, 1967) is an American artist, designer, and educator known for his work in digital fine art, originality in design, entertainment, and transportation.
Artistic themes
Pugh has explored many artistic themes including environmental-human entropy, bioengineering, advanced concept transportation, and evolutionary nanotechnology.[1]
Luminair
Pugh’s first solo publication, Luminair, presents a collection of digital life paintings developed in a novel approach to traditional representational art. Painting from life, Pugh's canvas is the laptop computer screen and his palette is the multitude of colors available to the digital artist. Traveling from his home in California to rural New England, Europe, and South America, he has painted a variety of images that capture the light and emotion of the scenes. For aspiring digital painters, the book contains instruction on the process used to create the images in the work.
Design instruction
For the past two years, Pugh has taught design courses at Art Center College of Design, including Originality in Design and Digital Rendering. In addition, Pugh is the creator of a series created with the Gnomon Workshop] on the topics of creature design illustration, environment rendering, and originality in design.
Xeno III
Pugh is also the creator of the Xeno III, a fully functioning, 500 horsepower, natural gas-fueled concept car. The design of Xeno III is raw and skeletal, but it is largely gold plated removing it from being either being a racecar or a luxury car.[2]
The Xeno III project is the subject of the book by Mark Christensen titled Build The Perfect Beast, published in 2001 by Thomas Dunne. The entire project was profiled in 2002 by Car Design News.
During the Xeno III project, Pugh co-founded an alternative-fuel transportation company called NGV-USA to do research in the field of automotive engineering. As a member of this firm, he received a U.S. Patent (Patent number 5,370,418) for inventing a unique design wherein natural gas cylinders are integrated with a standard "ladder" chassis. A prototype of the chassis was installed into a customized Dodge Ram Van called the "Long Ranger." This van was used by Cal Start and other governmental organizations to promote alternative-fuel vehicles.
Concept Design series
In addition to Luminair, Pugh's work is featured in both releases in the Design Studio Press series Concept Design, with his work featured on the cover of Concept Design 2.
Entertainment
Since 1997, Pugh has been the lead concept artist for visual effects studio Rhythm and Hues. His recent film projects include The Chronicles of Narnia, The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, Serenity, Oblivion, and Superman Returns.
Personal life
Born in Paris, Pugh grew up in the Berkeley Hills east of San Francisco. During his youth, he spent his time split between California and New England, where his mother and paternal grandmother still live. Before moving to Los Angeles in 1986 to attend Art Center, he lived in Coventry, England, where he took design and engineering courses at Coventry University. Since Art Center, Pugh has lived in Belmont Shore. He currently resides in the Bixby Knolls neighborhood of Long Beach with his family.
References
External links
Nick Pugh's Official Web Site