ABOUT

New York native Shilo Banks is an enigmatic artist inspired by the craft and history of painting. With a full military scholarship to Syracuse University, he lived the unlikely double life of artist and army officer in training.  Intense observation and a lifelong affection for the work of painters like John Singer Sargent, Maxfield Parrish, and Frederick Church led the artist to develop the style that defines his work. 

Banks’ musical roots as a sax player initially drew him to depict a series of Jazz paintings from gigs he personally attended. Next came Civil War paintings inspired by battle reenactments, which the artist frequents. Shooting his own photo reference from these battles, he then designs and composes emotional scenes of war and struggle. A love of landscape and architecture occupies the rest of Shilo’s painting journey, along with a fascination for documenting the rural decay of once beautiful buildings. A mountain recluse, Shilo is rarely spotted away from the “Luneville” studio he shares with the surrealist painter, Mark Garro.