Los Angeles-based artist Lee Piechocki spends a lot of time walking. As a kid, his family walked everywhere in their small, rural Midwestern neighborhood—so much so, that when his parents met one of the neighbors and introduced themselves as Dale and Pati Piechocki, the neighbor said, surprised: “Piechocki? I thought your last name was Walker. All the other neighbors refer to you as the walkers.” 

Today, walking is a critical part of Piechocki’s creative practice. “All my paintings begin as walks,” he says. “It is a good place to pay attention. Walks lead to photographs, memories, conversations, sensations, feelings, and sometimes, eventually, paintings.” He draws inspiration from the landscape of Los Angeles and its surrounding areas, finding fascination in the immense biodiversity of Southern California combined with the artificial veneer found only in Tinseltown. His interest in the layering of fact and fiction is reflected not only in the subject matter of his paintings, but in the painting methods themselves: “I make plein air watercolors from direct observation on location in domestic and wild terrains,” he explains. “I also make acrylic and oil paintings in the studio, employing an airbrush to explore photographic and cinematic effects, playing with depth of field, color, space, and light quality.”

See more from Lee Piechocki below!