Nick learned to paint from his mother when he was a child, but it wasn’t until college that he decided to be a career artist. His realist images of New York City are inspired by the drama of the city–the changing light, the spontaneous magic. Nick begins his process with reference photographs from his daily life, often shooting the same scene at multiple times of the day. He brings the images back to his Brooklyn studio where he composes a scene in Photoshop, adding and subtracting elements from multiple photographs to achieve the perfect composition before beginning to paint. “As my artwork is realistic, one might be tempted to think they are copies from nature,” says the artist. “Really, they are composed–every detail is considered. It is a balance between what is seen, what is true to nature, and what can make a good painting.”