George Gilliland

George Gilliland was born in East Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania. He began painting at the age of 13 when he took classes with a neighbor, the late Marcia DeRocco, a student of Thomas Hart Benton at the Kansas City Art Institute, and later a student at the Hans Hoffman school in New York. In high school he studied under Frederick Beaver, a painter and illustrator from Philadelphia who painted the original movie poster for "The African Queen."

He then enrolled in the BFA painting program at Kutztown State College, PA, where he studied under Rose Marie Sloat, Tony Evangelista, and James Carroll. At Kutztown he met Keith Haring and the illustrator Stephen Kroninger. He joined them and other members of the Kutztown-New York diaspora and settled in the East Village, where he met David Wojnarowicz, Paul Thek, and other Loisaida art regulars of that time.

He then moved to Kensington, Brooklyn, to concentrate on raising his daughter, Kathryn. To meet financial needs he took up graphic design and illustration. Shortly after 9/11 he decided to resume painting and enrolled in the New York Studio School, where he focused mainly on drawing and art history under Bruce Gagnier, who had a strong influence on his thinking by encouraging him to sea...