14th Street Manhattan with Tree and Figures Print

Friends and family of Edward Ching, going back to his early childhood, have long noted his exceptional drawing and painting abilities. Elementary school classmates, who reconnected with Edward decades later, attest they saved and still have pieces of his artwork. At the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, Edward decided to major in art. During a university summer art program in Italy, Edward won the "best portfolio" award, for his landscape watercolor paintings. "I studied very closely, John Singer Sargent's watercolors, from a book that was leant to me by Scott Prior, a well-known photo realist painter, and a visiting artist." After graduating with a BFA degree with a concentration in painting, Edward spent the 1990’s, selling his paintings and drawings in Key West, Paris, Austria, Germany, and Colombia. Edward later lived in Boston (where he is from), participating in the art scene in the 2000's, and teaching quill pen drawing in Harvard Square (Cambridge Center for Adult Ed.). Edward also won a first place award for an oil self portrait (Beacon Hill Art Walk). In 2007, Edward moved to New York City. In 2011, The Bruce Museum's landmark show, “Drawings by Rembrandt, his Students and Circle from the Maida and George Abrams Collection”, featured Edward's video on "Making a Quill Pen", which Edward created earlier. "I first picked up quill pen drawing (goose feather), in 1995, and stuck with it. I'd always been taken by the ink drawings of the old masters". Working from direct observation, “from life”, Edward often finds pictorial compositions and subjects in mundane settings. The ever-meandering physical forms from nature and Edward's rapidly assessing brush (or quill), attest to, the painter being the "athlete of the little muscles."