Rick Caughman’s first pieces of art were drawn on the walls of his parents’ house.
“I was very connected to art very early,” Caughman, an adjunct art instructor at San Bernardino Valley College, said. “I was four years old, drawing trains, planes, and automobiles. I’ve always known this was my nature.”
After attending a private school in upstate New York that didn’t offer art classes and a junior college where the “arts department was a closet with tempera paints,” Caughman moved to California and was accepted at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, where he trained in the communication arts.
He launched his career by illustrating magazine covers and posters, and over the last three decades, has worked as a graphic designer and teacher and produced fine, commercial, and public art, with clients including Los Angeles World Airports, Apple Computer, Omnitrans, Celestial Seasonings, Scripps College, and World Conservation Union.
One of his biggest—and most fun—projects was creating 14 wall illustrations for the international arrivals terminal at Ontario Airport.
“To be an artist is scary thing,” he said. “A musical artist or a vocalist or someone who reads their work, you’re putting yourself out there for people to assess. Art can be scary, but as an artist you have to be somewhat narcissistic to survive.”
His work has been shown at several galleries, including SBVC’s Gresham Gallery, but his latest exhibition was a special one. Sheets, Sheets, and Caughman: Art for Living and Living for Art, presented by the Ontario Museum of History and Art and the Chaffey Community Museum of Art in March of this year, featured notable commercial and just-for-fun pieces by Caughman and influential father and son artists Millard Sheets and Tony Sheets.
While Caughman has a longtime relationship with SBVC—he has been on the Graphic Design Advisory Board for several years—he only began teaching at the college last year. He brings with him over 10,000 hours of experience in the classroom studio.
“It’s a lot of hard work and it’s not easy, with lots of ups and downs, but I would say that my time has been my own, and that’s better than money,” he said.
– Submitted by San Bernardino Valley College
