Scott Rispin, originally from South Lake Tahoe, California, began his art career developing logos, carving, and hand-painting signs on the west coast. After moving to Erie, Pennsylvania in 1990, Rispin was a working professional in a wide variety of commercial arts. He earned his BA in Art Education from Mercyhurst University in 2003, and his MFA in painting from Edinboro University of Pennsylvania in 2008. While in Erie, Rispin spent 11 years teaching in the arts at Penn State Erie, the Behrend College and served as the Technical Director for the college’s Studio Theatre. After moving back west to Arizona in 2020, Rispin now focuses on creating artwork in his studio.

Texture and a physical presence are identifiable characteristics of Rispin’s images, as he aims to create work about attitudes, choices, and actively seeing versus looking. Most of his work celebrates the less than obvious aspects of landscapes. Rispin questions the nature and idea of “reality”. He asks: “How do you know what’s really there and what isn’t? How do you know what things really look like? You don’t really know – you just think you do. Parallel universes? Quite possibly. Orange water and purple grass? You bet.”