Josh Louchheim: Bio

   Josh Louchheim was born in Granite City, Illinois on August 19, 1982.  A few years later his family, mom, dad and sister, packed their lives into an RV and drove out to Scottsdale, Arizona. Where he has lived for the majority of his life.  

  Josh grew up skateboarding, racing BMX bikes and listening to music with friends. As a kid, skateboarding was his favorite thing in the world. He loved pushing himself to get better every day and would skate around the clock. To this day he believes his drive to be great at skateboarding instilled him with his current work ethic.

   Shortly after graduating high school, Josh ventured out to California where he gypsied around for a few years. Initially moving to Pacific Beach, followed by La Jolla then settling in Encinitas for the majority of his time in California. Each move bringing him closer to the ocean. While in California Josh worked in the kitchen of a steakhouse and spent his free time skateboarding, surfing and enjoying the beach life. But eventually he made his way back to the desert.  

   Once back in Arizona Josh made the decision to dedicate his life to art and began to put together a band; with the intentions of learning how to sing and blending his words with music.  Once the band was complete, and they had written enough songs, they began performing in venues throughout Phoenix. His band continued to play and write new music for a few years but later disbanded. This is when Josh decided to focus his creative efforts into painting. 

   As a child Josh had a natural ability to draw. But he never produced anything more than glorified doodles, with no real composition.  Since third grade art class, after learning about artists such as Van Gogh, Monet and Picasso, Josh had dreamed of being an artist.  He was fortunate to have grown up around working artists such as Philip C. Curtis and Bil Keane. Both were very close friends of his grandparents. Josh vividly remembers all the visits he made with them to Curtis’s studio. He was captivated with seeing a real artist in his workspace.  Those memories are ones Josh draws a lot of inspiration from and made the thought of being an artist feel tangible. 

   When Josh first began teaching himself how to paint, his style was very surrealistic, drawing inspiration from his love of Salvador Dali and Phil Curtis. His surrealistic works were predominantly staged within the western landscape he calls his home. Over the past few years Josh has become more focused on traditional western art, painting the west as he sees it through his eyes, while staying true to the style he has crafted for his work. 

Josh currently paints 6 days a week, using a very limited pallet of primary colors, a brown and a white.  He pushes himself to improve with each piece, by making the next painting more difficult than the last, working on bettering the composition, elaborating on details and his execution or color. All with the intention of trying to better portray what he envisions in his imagination. 

   Josh has now been painting, strictly with oil, for the past 13 years and exhibiting for the past 11 years. To date his work has been shown in various juried group exhibitions, invitational shows as well as 2 solo exhibits. Josh’s work is in many private collections across the country, spanning from California to New York. When Josh is not painting, he enjoys spending time with his family, wife of 9 years, their 8-year-old daughter and 20-year-old son (Josh’s stepson). Josh loves to travel and create memories and is also an avid golfer. He tries to play, or practice, at least once a week. Josh is continuously pushing himself to be the best he can be in all aspects of his life. And believe anything worth doing is worth over doing.