Meet Steven Swancoat, a 30-year-old full-time Ob/Gyn doctor and artist living in New York City’s TriBeCa. Steven moved to New York in July 2010 as a medical student where his father encouraged him to “give art a try”. Picking up the brush for the first time, he never imagined how his life would change forever. In just four years as a self-taught artist, he has had multiple exhibitions, made over 250 paintings, has been featured on Bravo Television, Art Basel, various magazines and raised over $21,000 for various charities using his artwork. Notably, he made a commissioned painting series for Russian President Vladimir Putin and hosted a show & fundraiser with Susan Sarandon at her Ping Pong Club, SPiN in NYC. Whom both have pieces of Swancoat’s work in their private collections. On top of his charitable efforts, he also resides as a board member for New York’s Ovarian Cancer Research Fund. This is Swancoat’s first time showing at the Affordable Art Fair. Outside of art and medicine, Swancoat’s newest passion is Astrophotography; shooting deep space and lunar photography using his ten telescopes from his TriBeCa loft apartment.
“In less than four years, Steven Swancoat as accomplished what many other artists only dream about achieving in a lifetime. He’s created over 250 paintings, held several solo exhibitions in New York City and raised several thousands of dollars for charity through his artwork. What’s surprising about Swancoat is that he never took a single art class and he became an up-and- coming artist in the middle of his medical training.”
– “New Physician Magazine”
Born in Santa Monica California and growing up in Michigan, Steven was never into art and has surprisingly still never taken a single art class. In high school, he was very much into woodshop and built himself a workshop of power tools in his basement. While a sophomore in high school, his father grounded him for an entire semester from TV or internet due to getting a 3.4 GPA. At that time, on Comedy Central, a tv show called Battlebots had recently come out, a show where contestants build large (up to 220 lbs) fighting robots all with one mission, to destroy the other robot. Steven asked his father, since he was grounded if he would help fund him to build these battlebots. His dad agreed, giving him a few hundred dollars. Over the next two years, Steven literally spent thousands of hours in his basement learning to design, wire and build various battlebots. By the time he graduated high school; he had built 14 various prototypes and competed two different 120 lbs battlebots that he built at national competitions. No one believed him when he said he wanted to be a doctor, everyone thought he was meant to be an engineer. The reason he mentions the battlebots is because though he never took an art class, he feels this was his first major step towards the creative process: to hide away in his basement workshop for hours a night, blasting rock and building fighting robots from scratch.
He eventually went to Michigan State. Graduated Pre-med and went to medical school in Kansas City Missouri. Medical School is four years. The first two are in the classroom studying and taking exams and the last two are out “In the field”, working in clinics, hospitals, and patient centers. His plan was always to go to Philly for his rotations, then residency and then go into head and neck reconstructive plastic surgery. This however, changed when he fell in love with NYC and the night before picking his site, he changed from Philly to Newark NJ. He got the site and moved to New York’s Upper West Side.
He moved to the UWS on July 6th, 2010. In early November, his father visited and suggested that “Now that you are in New York, the Art capital of the work, you should get into art”. Steven told him he can’t paint or draw, but had an old point and shoot camera so he decided to take photos. He shot NYC landscapes, central parks, the buildings. He downloaded a little editing program and started printing his photos and putting them in frames he would find at housing works. His father called him up again and told him about a must-see art documentary about an unknown street artist named Banksy. Steven looked it up and the next day went to MoMa to watch “Exit Thru the Gift Shop”.
It was actually Mr. Brainwash who inspired Steven to start painting. He looked at him; never before picking up a brush or canvas, and next thing you know he is a full-time artist and sold nearly a million dollars of artwork in a month. Steven told himself, “If he can do it, so can I!” That next day Steven put the camera down and went out to get painting supplies. He started cutting his own stencils and made his first paintings, which were not that great. But after a little practice, you get better and better. Then a year from the day he actually got his first solo exhibition at a place called Nancy’s Wines for Food on 75th and Columbus. He felt so lucky and blessed he wanted to double it as a fundraiser for Ovarian Cancer as he now learned that he wanted to go into Obstetrics and Gynecology.
The show was a success, he made 24 paintings for that exhibition, selling a handful, and raised over 1,100 dollars for Ovarian Cancer. Over the next few years while starting his residency he had a handful of shows, including a large solo exhibition as an intern, where he sold 15 of the 18 paintings on opening night. He met his new neighbor, Tripp Derrick Barnes, who went to art school but stopped painting. He encouraged him to paint a collaboration on an old closet door with him. Derrick got his artistic inspiration from the collections of Charles Saatchi and other similar art enthusiasts. He was thus able to influence Steven considerably. Though reluctant at first, he eventually gave in, which was the start not only of a great friendship but a great art partnership, which lead him to soon become a full-time artist.
About two years from this, though no one thought it would work, he wrote actress Susan Sarandon to team up with her at SPiN, her ping pong club and do a large art show, charity fundraiser, and ping pong event. Despite everyone’s belief, she wrote him back and shortly after the New Year, they had a big show planned with her at her space. Shortly following this, though a real crazy story, he learned that their new high-risk obstetrics doctor at the hospital was recently on the Russian Winter Olympics as one of their physicians and was also a friend with Putin. As a good gesture, he and the Russian embassy commissioned Steven to make a painting, which turned into a 3 part series for President Vladimir Putin. He had a onetime opening at the David Benrimon.
Steven’s last major solo exhibition was in August 2015, which was his best selling show to date. His work setting new records for prices and amount of pieces sold. Following this show, Steven though exhibit a few paintings in Art Basel, took a 6-month hiatus from painting to focus on medicine, but also his newest art form, Astrophotography. Set up off his TriBeCa terrace, he uses one of his many telescopes to shoot both deep space and high-resolution lunar imaging. What started as simple hobby of astronomy over the past year has morphed into not only his newest art form but another passion along with painting.
Most recently as of Summer 2016, Steven picked back up painting again. Like he had never put the brush down, his newest painting series, his “Masterpiece” series, in which he makes his Pop-Art renditions of old masterpiece paintings is some of his best and by far most challenging and complex work yet. He is currently preparing for exhibiting at the Affordable Art Fair which is Sept 28 – Oct 2 and display his new works for the first time.
The contemporary art world is vibrant and booming like never before and it’s a twenty-first-century phenomenon, a global industry in its own right. Contemporary Artists seek the power to astonish, satisfy and challenge: the legend of Steven Swancoat’s artwork achieves all of these things. He showcases art that the public may not ordinarily have access to outside of a large urban environment within a welcoming, creative, and inspirational platform. As time goes on Steven will continue to delve deeper into the world of art by utilizing a wide range of mediums and taking an intimate approach to art direction and design. He will further build his brand and develop more designs and artwork. We will all be looking forward to seeing what he accomplishes next with his limitless creativity and unique take on art!
Check out his website: http://swancoatart.bigcartel.com/
Follow him on Instagram: @SwancoatArt
Email: [email protected]
