Gregory Guiteras (B 1942) American, Oil on Canvas Nude. Signed and dated '74 bottom right. Titled "Standing Nude". Address, title, and further information on back. 

Overall: 38 1/2 x 32 in. 

Sight: 27 1/4 x 21 1/4 in.

#3093 . 

Gregory Guiteras was born in Florida in 1942. He attended Saint Leo College Preparatory School, where he was first introduced to early Christian art. He worked on the student paper, yearbook, and sang in the glee club, as well as creating editorial cartoons which won him recognition from the Quill and Scroll Honor Society. Originally called to be a monk, he went to the Benedictine Saint John’s University in Minnesota, graduating with a degree in philosophy and classical languages. He spent three years in Quebec studying French and Latin at Université Laval, before a sports injury left him bedridden for over a month, during which he began to draw and paint in earnest. He chose not to become a man of the cloth and spent the next three years in Chicago, taking courses at the American Academy of Art College on any medium he could. In 1973 he started courses at the Art Students League in New York, receiving a Ford Foundation Grant in 1976 for his work in printmaking. He worked as a freelance artist for the next ten years, creating illustrations for books and portraits. After assisting an associate with woodworking he became entranced by the process, and became Head of Finishing at the Osborne and Kraemer Architectural Woodworking. He obtained a certificate in the process through the Finishing School in Floral Park, and opened his own company, Gregory Guiteras Decorative Finishes, in 1988. For the next two decades he worked primarily as a restorer, conservation, and creator of art objects, as well as painting murals and developing pieces in plaster. A lifelong Catholic, he became a supporter of St. Jean’s Players, the oldest continually operating community theater company on the Upper East Side of Manhattan based out of the St. Jean Baptiste Church and High School, painting dozens of backdrops, scrims, and advertisements for them. Today, he continues to divide his time between his business and personal art studio in Brooklyn and a home in Tampa, Florida.