Painter Paul Seymour stands beside works he created during his time as artist-in-residence on the Allegheny National Forest.

Painter Paul Seymour, Allegheny National Forest summer artist-in-residence, is pursuing a second career in the arts with a focus on using art to advocate for natural spaces.

“I chose to go into the field of music,” Seymour said. “But I have done visual art all along. The whole time I’ve been a selling artist.”

Seymour spent 35 years as a music teacher and is now focusing on visual art, particularly plein air, or on location, painting.

“Specifically, as an artist, I enjoy painting still life, floral compositions and pet portraits,” he said. “But my real passion is landscapes. I would say 60 percent of my artistic life or more is spent painting the landscape.”

The new ANF artist-in-residence program gave Seymour a chance to immerse himself in that passion.

“I’ve always been someone who got my energy from nature,” he said. “When I heard about this residency, it was a perfect fit. I have a real commitment and passion for public lands.”

Seymour said he makes an effort to utilize his art to highlight public lands through social media outreach.

“I would say every outdoor painting I’ve done for the last ten years has been on public lands,” he noted. “I use my social media platform to bring attention to public lands. I would like nothing more than to be a spokesman for public lands.”

Seymour said he appreciates the freedom the ANF program gives artists.

“The Forest Service is doing a wonderful service to the artistic community by not putting a lot of stipulations on what we’re doing,” he said. “I have uninterrupted freedom to create.”

He also said he feels the program can help spotlight all the Forest Service does.

“The fact that they’re doing these residencies is a good opportunity to let the public know what they’re doing,” Seymour said. “The scope of their work is just mind boggling. I think the public needs to know the service they do to our community at-large.”

Of his work in general, Seymour said he is less interested in photo-realism than interpretation.

“I’m not interested in rendering an object. I’m interested in capturing how light plays on an object,” he said. “To render that is the goal. To capture that is the challenge.”