Luc Leestemaker (1957-) Dutch/American, grew up in the Netherlands, where interests in art, theater and communication led him into such diverse professions as remedial teacher; founder of an Amsterdam based performing arts center; founder of the European art collective "Hart Poetry;" founder and editor of a monthly business and arts magazine; and managing director of "Leestemaker & Associates," a consulting firm specializing in arts' marketing, financing, and public relations. But it would be Leestemaker's long-standing interest in painting (his grandfather and great-grandfather were artists), that would ultimately command his devotion.

Throughout the years he subconsciously knew that he needed time to build the psychological framework for his art. Upon moving to the US in 1990, Leestemaker felt he was ready to fully commit to painting. Not unlike other European and Dutch artists, (particularly Willem de Kooning), living and working in the US, created a dramatic transition. His stylistic journey would take him from early inspiration by the CoBrA movement; through densely abstract expressionist art compositions; to the current "Inner Landscape" and "Transfigurations" Series, which are situated on the borderline of realism and abstraction and inspired both by Mark Rothko and 18th Century Dutch and English landscape painters (notably Ruysdael, Constable).

Leestemaker sees the role of the artist as the shaman, or the Greek priest, translating the message of the gods into worldly understood action and matter. The painter does this visually. The tragic mistake of the romantic idea of the artist is that he has lost half of this message. This has cast the artist in the eternal role of the outsider, where as Leestemaker believes that the role of the artist is to fill the world with spirituality and make it whole.

He does not subscribe to the recent 19th / 20th century romantic notion that the artist must be a solitary, suffering individual who locks himself away in a state of despair, creating art that can only be understood by a select few. He has often found that the limitations and challenges in collaborating with a multitude of disciplines (developer, architect, designer art-consultant), become very rewarding when new solutions or ideas come out as a result of those challenges. Those solutions and challenges become part of the development and creative process reflected in his own artwork in the studio.