Gary Pendleton Biography

Gary Pendleton is a noted plein air painter and illustrator. He has a passion for art and nature and especially for art history. Over the past two years he combined these three passions into a book soon to be released by Schiffer Publishing, "100 Plein Air Painters of the Mid Atlantic." McBride Gallery will be honoring Gary with a book signing event and an exhibit of the 100 painters in his book in November, 2014.

After painting in oils for a number of years, Gary began exploring painting outdoors, en plein air, the scenes he saw every day around the Chesapeake Bay from farms in south county, to wooded areas to marshlands along the Bay. Gary joined the Mid Atlantic Plein Air Painters Association and in 2010 was elected President of the Association. He has participated in numerous plein air painting events across the Mid-Atlantic beginning in 2005 when he was selected to be one of 25 painters to participate in ‘Paint Annapolis’. He received an Award of Merit for his oil painting titled, “Water, Color, Sky.”

In 2007 he was selected to participate in the Wayne Plein Air festival in Wayne Pennsylvania. In 2008 an oil painting titled "Kilmarnock Marsh" was selected for inclusion in the Adkins Arboretum annual Art Competition. He was again juried into the Paint Annapolis event in 2008. In June 2009, 11 of his oil paintings were featured in a group exhibit “Rising Stars: 10 Artists to Watch” at McBride Gallery in Annapolis in June 2009.

Gary was a writer for Bay Weekly for over 20 years, illustrating a column with scratchboard paintings of songbirds, wildlife and historic buildings throughout the Mid Atlantic states.

Additional publications include: 15 scratchboard illustrations for the widely distributed brochure Travel through the Centuries: The Historic Treasures of Calvert County. In 2003 Gary illustrated A Lifelong Affair a memoir by Bethine Church, widow of Senator Frank Church, published by the Francis Press. In 2004 he contributed over 40 illustrations to St. Leonard: A Maryland Tidewater Community, which received a prestigious award from the Maryland Historical Trust.

McBride Gallery is pleased to show the paintings of the multi-talented artist, writer, and musician, Gary Pendleton.