Tyler Willis is Brazilian American, his mother from Salvador, Bahia, and he was born and raised in San Anselmo, California. Growing up, he and his mom would go back to Brazil to visit family every June through August. Willis left Marin County for college in Pennsylvania to study mechanical engineering and to get out of his California comfort zone. After graduating, Willis returned to the Bay Area and began working in commercial real estate.
He worked in the commercial real estate industry for about nine years, but hasn’t been involved with it since deciding to pursue being an artist full-time, a path he believes he was always on in the first place. He adds that while he loves the East Coast, the weather was brutal for him and he prefers the mild and sunny weather of Northern California. He currently lives in the Russian Hill neighborhood of San Francisco.
“The Bay Area art community is incredible. My art studio is in Dogpatch and I have met numerous people here who have been so welcoming and supportive. I have other artists over to my studio or I visit their spaces almost weekly to chat, work on side projects, and talk about personal goals or challenges. I love the fact that everyone enjoys collaborating and giving advice,” he said.
With his background in both architecture and engineering from studies at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania (2010), Willis developed a curiosity in how things merge together to become something new.
“While in high school, I had this grand idea that if I majored in mechanical engineering, I could make an Iron Man suit one day. In college, I realized mechanical engineering was too dry. I still wanted to do something engineering-related but with some added creativity, so I decided to switch to architecture and maintain an emphasis on structural engineering,” Willis said.
The creativity component was not new to Willis, who has made art since he was old enough to hold a crayon. But even then, it was more of an opportunity to investigate the many aspects of an object rather than to have something to hang on a wall.
“Art was always something I did for fun, so I rarely kept anything to display. Similar to how I would take apart my toys and experiment with electric motors and other components, I did it to see what I could make. And then I would move on and try to learn about the next thing that was interesting to me,” he said.
His propensity for inquisitiveness urged an incorporation of other, less customary materials in order to construct a larger visual vocabulary.
“I began practicing drawing with charcoal and graphite on paper and gradually moved towards the large canvases I am creating now, primarily with oil paints. Typically, I use acrylic paints for larger background elements because of the shorter drying times and sometimes include other materials to achieve certain effects,” Willis said.
Describing his work as vibrant, detailed, and personal, Willis says his inspirations come from his friends and family, which spurred him into pursuing portraiture based on personal subjects close at hand. Though many figures in his more recent paintings are not specifically people he knows, he says they are still informed by the people in his life. He sometimes works from self as subject, as well.
“I tend to use my own face or body as a reference in a lot of my pieces because I can quickly take a photo of my hand or profile in specific lighting to figure out the shading in a particular painting, when necessary,” he said.
Willis credits two of his teachers in high school, Agnes Cecile and Sam Spratt, as creative inspirations while also pointing to pioneer of abstract art, Piet Mondrian (1872-1944) as a primary influence.
“I love basic geometry and primary colors because you can create anything just by combining the basics,” he said. “If you understand the basic proportions and structure of a subject, you can essentially draw the ‘scaffolding’ of a person and tweak the details, so to speak. I emphasize the faces and poses of each figure while paying attention to the detail in how the fabric of each of their outfits would wrinkle and fold in real life, as in my paintings Poise in Pink and Embrace in Noir,” Willis said.
He added that he paints primarily with oils because it allows more subtle blending of the colors over a longer period of time. Being able to manipulate the paint over a number of days or weeks is crucial to his process, he said, because of the size of the paintings, which range from five to over six feet in height.
“Sometimes I can nail down the lighting and shadows quickly, but more often than not, I have to step away for a bit and come back later to look at the painting with fresh eyes and see what needs to be altered or emphasized,” he said.
Willis has been in his current studio in the Dogpatch neighborhood since March 2023. It’s an industrial loft space with white walls, large windows, and brick accents with a beautiful view of the Bay. He says he takes in an inspiring sunset at the end of each workday. But well before that, he begins each day with what he refers to as his “set-up” stage. Willis first cleans his painting area and tools in order to begin each session fresh. If there are paintings in progress, he also uses this time to plan the next steps, figure out new ideas, or think through his technical approach.
“If I’m starting a new piece, I use set-up time to brainstorm poses and color combinations in my head. Once I have a concept in my mind, I immediately start sketching the idea digitally, using an app called Procreate on my iPad. This allows me to get the concept out of my head and begin to play with poses, colors, and backgrounds,” Willis said.
Part of his process is to record the steps in time lapse so he can review what works—or what doesn’t—and to track his progress, as in his video of the creation of Poise in Pink.
“When I start the painting, I sketch the rough figure on canvas with pencil. Sometimes I’ll do an initial coat of the background color to save time if I feel it will be difficult to come back and paint the background once the subject is mostly done. It’s difficult for me to say when a piece is done. Sometimes I’ll have a friend come in and point out anything that looks ‘off’ to them and I’ll make a note. Then I’ll go back and see what needs to be corrected, if anything,” Willis said.
The artist says the largest change in his creative process has been the transition to working with paint. Previously most comfortable creating pencil drawings, which he says helped him develop an understanding of light and shadow in grayscale to create the illusion of three-dimensional form, paint was wholly different.
“Painting was a challenge at first because of the precision of the tools themselves. I didn’t feel as confident in rendering with a soft paintbrush as I felt with a sharpened pencil to create small details,” Willis said.
The second interesting challenge for the artist was transitioning not just in tools, scale, and surface material but from black and white to color, which entailed learning to mix paint effectively and work with a broader spectrum of choices.
“Skin tones have a number of subtle hues that make up the whole. In some cases, the light that reflects on a surface changes the perceived color. For example, sometimes the color from a shirt should cast its color on the subject’s cheek. Playing with colors, whether pursuing realism or adding a touch of expression, is a balance that feels different for every painting,” he said.
The occurrence of his commitment to making art was very much a result of a confluence of circumstances pushing him forward. During the pandemic, with more time on his hands, his work blossomed as he began producing a larger volume of work. At the time, he didn’t have a studio and was living with roommates which restricted his ability to have paint and canvases everywhere. Because of those space constraints, he gravitated toward making digital drawings on an iPad, many of which were figures in the music world. He began posting the work and sharing his process on social media and received very positive feedback.
“In August 2021, I decided to challenge myself and draw a one-hour portrait every day for seven days. A representative from Amazon Music reached out to me to do some artwork videos for them to post on their social media platforms. That was one of the catalysts that gave me the confidence to pursue art full-time,” he said.
As his work evolves, Willis is not content to rely on one method in developing his work and utilizes various materials to assist his process. The integration of media such as epoxy resin, approached through a technical lens, allows the artist to create more textured layering effects and dimension. And he says the use of 3D printing has been integral to his process.
“I use 3D printing in a variety of ways, most commonly as a convenient way to make specific tools that I need right away instead of going out and buying them. For example, I’ve made a dock/stand for my laptop, paintbrush and pencil holders, and bins to organize tools in drawers. I also print stencils for complex shapes or print fun things like superhero masks to give out to friends or to put on display,” Willis said.
While his works mainly fit inside the genre of Photorealism, at the same time his occasional untitled paintings are a departure from the figure, allowing the artist to dip his toe into the realm of Abstract Expressionism. Willis says he will continue to pursue both styles and once he feels he has a better understanding of each, will incorporate more abstract elements into his portraits. This curiosity for multiple methods and materials extends and overlaps into a variety of other interests and hobbies.
“My wife and friends joke with me about that. I love anything mechanical and I like to take things apart. I love anything technology related from hardware to software. More often than not, I’ll get a little too deep into explaining what I’ve learned about all kinds of things, from practicing jiu jitsu to new 3D printing projects, or whatever I’m getting into,” he said.
The artist’s gradual evolution from technical studies and basic drawing technique to full-scale paintings culminated in his first solo exhibition, Portraits, at Gallery 181. Willis says the series of paintings from the show will continue to expand, along with some private commissions on his plate heading into the new year.
“My wife and I are also expecting our first son in March of 2025, so we’re excited and getting ready for that new chapter in our life. I’m looking forward to the new experiences and inspiration my son will bring,” he said.
Tyler Willis says he enjoys when people view his black-and-white renderings and vivid paintings on canvas and see faces that remind them of people in their own lives. Even more so, he is tickled when viewers try to guess the story behind a painting. But he hopes to inspire something more.
“I’d like people to look at my work and be encouraged to seek out more art around them,” he said. “There are so many incredible artists in the world who are waiting to share what they have. People are unique and beautiful. It’s worth discovering what’s out there.”
For more information, visit his website at tylerwillis.app and his page on Instagram.
