Russell Recchion - Artist
Russell Recchion grew up just outside Pittsburgh, where his early education included the Tam O'Shanter art classes at the Carnegie Museum of Art, a program that set the direction for everything that followed. He graduated from the Art Institute of Pittsburgh in 1974, and a semester abroad in Italy during his studies convinced him that fine art, not commercial work, was where he belonged.
He went on to enroll at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia — America's oldest art school, founded by Charles Wilson Peale — where he immersed himself in the tradition of American oil painting. The artists who shaped his eye were the masters of that tradition: Gilbert Stuart, Thomas Sully, Cecilia Beaux, and Thomas Eakins. During this period he also studied alongside Nelson Shanks, the commissioned portrait artist of the Vatican and the British Royal Family, whose command of color and light left a lasting impression on Russell's own approach to paint.
That foundation built a career spanning more than thirty years. Russell has been commissioned by corporate executives, physicians, university presidents, federal judges, and philanthropists. In 2024, he was selected to paint the official gubernatorial portrait of Governor Eric Holcomb for the state of Indiana, one of the most significant commissions in American portrait painting.
In 2000, Russell relocated to Tucson, Arizona with his wife and two sons, where the landscape opened a new chapter in his work. The desert Southwest — its light, its color, its cowboys and Native American subjects — became the basis for an extensive body of paintings collected across the United States and Europe, and documented in his 2019 book Russell Recchion: Collected Works.
Russ's introduction to Naval art came through one of his students, John Cooney, a gifted artist in his own right and a former Navy pilot. As their friendship developed, John proposed a partnership: a company dedicated to Naval Aviation art. Russ agreed to paint one piece during the Covid lockdown — "Old Salt," depicting the USS Nimitz at sea. The challenge of painting this majestic ship at sea with all the colors of the ocean intrigued him. It was well received, and that single painting became the first of a series of four. Full Sail Fine Art was born.
The Naval Aviation Collection represents a natural expression of Russell's lifelong approach: subjects that carry real weight (like a 100,000-ton naval aircraft carrier), painted with the technical discipline to do them justice. Each painting in the collection, from the flight deck of the USS Nimitz to the cockpit of an F-14 Tomcat over the South China Sea, is a fine art original rendered in oil, available as a limited-edition print.