Born on 9 July 1975 in Southern California, Joseph Callahan knew that he had a creative spirit from a young age. “I can’t remember a time when I was not ‘creating’ in one medium or another,” he explains. Completely self-taught, Callahan didn’t think that he could make a living as an artist, so he pursued more stable work and he was introduced to lapidary arts in 2000. Picking up the skills of a stone-cutter, he began created beaded and stone jewelry. In addition to his bead and stone work, Callahan paints with both acrylics and digital media. Even so, he says, “I am sure the intense patterns you can find in stones will come out in my art no matter what medium I work in … once a rock hound, always a rock hound!”

Whatever the medium, Callahan’s art is potent and expressive; art is like therapy to him and painting is an emotional release. “That is what my painting is about, the raw emotion unchained by conventional borders.” The abstract expressionist pieces he paints are a reflection of his potent emotions. The success he has encountered allows him to make his art his career. Once, he remembers, “I never thought I could ‘live’ as an artist without formal training; now I’m at a point where I can’t live without being an artist.”