About the Artist

A Short Bio

I was born in Habana Cuba and migrated to Spain at the age of 5 with my mother and grandmother. I spent two years in the outskirts of Madrid learning to play futbol, absorbing the local accent and trying, at times unsuccessfully, to stay out of trouble. When we arrived in the United States, I was enthralled with the enormous size of the skyscrapers and cars in New York City. As a child I loved to travel into Manhattan with my grandfather to purchase fabrics for his custom tailor business, all the while hoping to catch a glimpse of Spiderman swinging amid the skyscrapers. I started learning to draw by copying comic books. At that early age I couldn’t comprehend how it was possible for people to draw such amazing art, since my attempts to replicate the drawings were abysmal.

Being the first in my family with a serious interest in art, I have to credit my High School art teacher, Thomas Carcich with giving me my foundation in art and being instrumental in guiding me to study art in college. After receiving a BFA from New Jersey City University in 1988, I worked in several  small business to business advertising agencies in New Jersey as an artist before marrying and moving to Orlando Florida to start a family with my wife in 1992. Here I have worked as an artist for Disney, Scholastic, and Universal among others, enjoying my share of success in both the commercial and Fine Arts.

I returned to my first true art-love, oil painting, in 2012 after an unintentional hiatus of well over 20 years. Wanting to give my mother a more unique Birthday present than in recent years, I decided to do a small oil painting for her. While delighted at how much I enjoyed the process, I was more than a little dismayed at how much I had forgotten about painting! Although Mom loved the painting, I immediately set out to bring my skill with oils up to where I wanted them to be. I know I can never reach my ever advancing and evolving goal, but I strive to make progress with every painting. I’ve repurposed and refurbished my home studio to paint from life. That’s where I can always be found trying to make up for lost 20 years. With more ideas than time to paint them all, my easel is never empty. I have been fortunate to win recognition in local and regional art shows and am starting to enjoy recognition at the National level. I still live and paint in Orlando with my wonderfully supportive family, and two very mischievous cats.

My Newsletter is the best way to see my process, latest paintings and news. Subscribers get all the information before I post it on social media. I also post occasionally about my artistic process (and my cats) on Instagram under PardoStudio.

I am  a Master Artist of the National Oil and Acrylics Painters Society and part of their mentor program.

Here is a video of the artist's talk at my first solo exhibit.

LLL Artist Talk from Jose Pardo on Vimeo.

And this is a short interview at the Orange County Administration Building where I was invited to exhibit my paintings:

“I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I intended to be.” - Douglas Adams