Portrait Of An Artist: Paul Fletcher

At his home studio in Westlake, Paul Fletcher is using one of the oldest art forms in the world to create uniquely textured paintings. Fletcher said he specializes in landscape and wildlife, and at the , he was showing pieces with richly textured birch trees, rolling green hills dotted with sheep and subtle colors.

"These pieces are painted entirely in beeswax," he said of everything in his booth. "It's an ancient art form that's been around for thousands of years. There are very few people who paint in the medium and I'm one of the only people who handles it in a traditional painting fashion, and I sculpt it a little on the surface."

Fletcher was inspired to take up the medium after reading an article about Jasper Johns, an American artist who became famous in the 1950s and 1960s for his prints and paintings, and laid the groundwork for both Pop Art and Minimalism. Johns also painted in encaustic, and was one of the only artists at the time to use the medium.

"I started experimenting with it three years ago," Fletcher said. "It took me about a year to figure out how to control it the way I wanted to paint with it, and this is the end effect I came up with."