On Wayne Forte’s website, along with over a hundred of his paintings, is an invitation to send the painter “suggestions, comments, concerns, questions, rebukes, rebuttals and replies,” with a link that lets you send email to Forte’s personal account. Probably Forte is the only painter in America who issues viewers a standing invitation to rebuke him—and gives them such a direct way to do it. The offer gives a fairly accurate illustration of the man and the artist. He produces paintings on his own—he’s monstrously prolific—as well as in collaboration with the arts group at the megachurch he attends in southern California, and to a degree he is willing to give the community influence over his paintings, which appear in worship services there. Sometimes they’ll ask him to change things, and often he’ll do what they ask. He sees it as an intrinsic part of his calling as a painter that he has what he calls “a necessary role within the community of the faithful”—which means that the church needs him, but also that he needs the church. In the art world, where the individual ego generally rules supreme and unsettling the viewer is often part of the plan, the idea that an artist would change something because it makes a viewer uncomfortable seems almost heretical. Forte, on the other hand, refuses to take himself so seriously. His paintings are full of light and playfulness, but at the same time they’re unshakably grounded and solid. His canvases teem with motion, life, and color. In service of his community, he strives to find a balance between common symbols and fresh vision: Wristwatches, fruit, animals, plants, angels, cityscapes, and superman form exuberant constellations in these joyous collages of color and symbol. And everywhere throughout is the human figure: blocky, earthbound, fleshy, and beautiful. Here is a vision driven not by ego but by humility and love.

I Adam II. 2005. Oil and acrylic on canvas. 76 x 82 inches.

Some of Forte’s work is featured in Image issue 13 as well as issue 38.

Biography

Wayne Forte was born in Manila, Philippines in 1950, and grew up in Santa Barbara, California. He earned his B.A. at UC Santa Barbara and his M.F.A. at UC Irvine. In 1981 he was married to Valeria Vassao in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and they now have 4 children. As a CIVA member, he participated in the Florence Portfolio Project in Florence, Italy. He has been a member of the arts ministry of his local church for over 15 years, and sits on the Board of Directors for The Grove Center for the Arts. He has had solo exhibits at S.U.N.Y. Cortland and Oswego, Calvin College, Westmont College, Fuller Theological Seminary, and Northwest Nazarene University. His work is represented locally by S.C.A.P.E. in Corona del Mar, CA.

To see more work, visit www.WayneForte.com.

Current Projects
March 2007

Setting up the Cross. 2005. Oil on canvas. 36 x 36 inches.

“Presently, I am trying to escape the Modernist straight jacket in which I find myself bounded by my education and 30 years of practice. I know I will never completely shed this language or way of thinking but I have realized that Modernism was never meant to express the nature of man’s relationship to God or to the Biblical narrative which tells us about God. Therefore I am reaching back to old liturgical forms (tallits, ziziths, icons, reliquaries, banners, flannel-graphs, chalk-talks) discarded by Modernism, and trying to breathe new life into them by taking a Post-Modern approach. I can say that these “out-moded” forms do provide a fertile ground and appropriate structure for my artistic goals.

I spent nine weeks last spring in Italy (teaching for four weeks at Gordon College’s Orvieto campus), tracing the perimeter of the country by car and researching ecclesiastic art forms in the cathedrals and museums.”