Joe Richards

Joe Richards (American, 1921-2007) attended night classes at the Mizen Academy of Art in Chicago while working days in a clothing store. He enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1942 and served as a signalman. He married his wife, Betty, in 1943, and was discharged from the Navy in 1945. The couple returned to Chicago, where Richards enrolled at the American Academy of Art and served as a merchant seaman with the U.S. Coast Guard. He then studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts before settling in New York City in 1951. Richards became known for his photorealist paintings of rural and urban industrial subjects. He showed his paintings, which depicted objects such as locomotive engines, oil rigging, and... more.