Fair Winds by Craig Mooney
Craig Mooney

Craig Mooney is an oil painter known for painting dramatic skies and seascapes with a cinematic sense of mystery. 

A self-described “native New Yorker living in Vermont,” Craig was born in 1969 and raised in the heart of midtown Manhattan, where the city served as an endless source of inspiration. Craig received a BA from Wheaton College and later attended the Vermont Studio Center in Johnson, but regards his early exposure to art -- painting at the elbow of his hobby artist father -- as the truest form of training he ever received. 

Craig followed a circuitous path into the art world. An early stint in the film industry working for iconic production company Merchant and Ivory led to a turn at medical school, where he worked as a lab tech in a city hospital. Always painting, Craig entered work in a hospital employee art show, where his talent was noticed by the director of public affairs. Commissions led to more commissions and by the early 2000s Craig had relocated to Vermont where he began to paint full-time.

An unabashed romantic, Craig’s expansive landscapes are often dominated by radiant skies, light-filled clouds and deep, open space. While his early works were inspired by magazine photographs of the countryside, today Craig paints his figures, city scenes, and landscapes entirely from imagination - a skill he attributes to his early years painting within the confines of a converted storage closet in a city apartment.

Often called “cinematic,” Craig works in moody tones with sweeping brush strokes. He credits his early professional experiences in film production as inspiration for the similar process of “producing” a painting, with similar attention to movement, contrast and drama.  Evocative and ambiguous, Craig’s work is participatory, allowing the viewer to become a part of the story each painting tells. “When I paint something I strive to leave the details out,” Craig says. “If you leave the details out, people can share the process of understanding. If you abstract a portrait, the subject can be you.”

For the past decade Craig has made annual summer trips to the Cape and Islands, where he became quickly enamored by the endlessly affecting beauty of the open skies and sea. “The beauty in this area is such an enormous source of inspiration for me,” Craig says.  “I’ve found myself pulled more and more towards the coast.” 

Craig is now represented by over 20 galleries nationwide. He has had international shows across Europe as well as in Singapore and has received many high-profile commissions. His work is held in private collections around the globe.

Craig lives and paints in Stowe, Vermont.

Fair Winds
Craig Mooney
Oil on Canvas
36" x 36"
$6,500
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