The School of Priority Thinking
“The School of Priority Thinking” is a representation of Raphael’s classic work “The School of Athens.” It features a new set of historically significant figures representing the four main approaches to work and ethics today. Author Peter DeMarco draws on lessons learned from each of these important figures as he writes his upcoming books. The image below is a digital scan of a 4-foot by 7-foot oil painting which realist painter Christian Kolupski was commissioned to create.
Hover your cursor over the figures in the painting to read descriptions.
About the Artist
Christian Kolupski is a realist painter whose attraction to the beauty of the human face and its many nuanced expressions, as well as his empathy with his subjects, truly captured the spirit of Priority Thinking. Although he never had formal education in fine arts, Christian pursued self-directed studies under several of different artists. Many of them served as his mentors.
Art instructor, David DeClerk, steered Christian toward representational painting. Artists Ed Salazar and Alan Boyle mentored Christian in indirect and direct oil painting methods. Artists Gail Chambers and Theresa Manns schooled Christian in ideal forms. Christian also considers the color concepts learned from Graydon Parrish through his Rational Painting forum to be pivotal to his development.
Christian attended classes at The Art Student’s League of New York with figurative artist Dean Keller, and portrait artists Everett Raymond Kinstler, and Nelson Shanks. He later continued his studies with Nelson Shanks at his Philadelphia atelier, Studio Incamminati.
Christian exhibits throughout Western New York, Colorado, and Utah, and has works in public and private collections around the world. He currently lives in Rochester, NY with his wife, Michele, and two children, Harrison and Violet.