John Howard Sanden (August 6, 1935 – December 24, 2022) was an American portrait artist.

Biography

Early life

Sanden was born in

Austin, Texas Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of Texas, as well as the county seat, seat and largest city of Travis County, Texas, Travis County, with portions extending into Hays County, Texas, Hays and Williamson County, Texas, Williamson co ...

, on August 6, 1935. He graduated from the

Minneapolis School of Art The Minneapolis College of Art and Design (MCAD) is a private college specializing in the visual arts and located in Minneapolis, Minnesota. MCAD currently enrolls approximately 800 students. MCAD is one of just a few major art schools to offer ...

in 1956 with a bachelor of fine arts degree in illustration.Alumni Careers - John Howard Sanden, ’56
Minneapolis College of Art and Design. Accessed December 4, 2013.

Career

Sanden was the

Art Director Art director is the title for a variety of similar job functions in theater, advertising, marketing, publishing, fashion, film industry, film and television, the Internet, and video games. It is the charge of a sole art director to supervise and ...

for the

Billy Graham Evangelistic Association The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association (BGEA) is a non-profit Christian outreach organization that promotes multimedia evangelism, conducts evangelistic crusades, and engages in disaster response. The BGEA operates the Billy Graham Traini ...

from 1955 to 1970. He founded the Portrait Institute. He was also an instructor at The

Art Students League of New York The Art Students League of New York is an art school at 215 West 57th Street in Manhattan, New York City, New York. The League has historically been known for its broad appeal to both amateurs and professional artists. Although artists may stu ...

. He won the 2005

Portraits, Inc. Portraits, Inc., is the world's oldest and largest commissioned portrait company. Founded in New York City in 1942, Portraits, Inc. specializes in commissioned oil painting, paintings or bronze sculpture, sculptures. Today the agency represents o ...

Lifetime Achievement Award, for which a

scholarship A scholarship is a form of financial aid awarded to students for further education. Generally, scholarships are awarded based on a set of criteria such as academic merit, diversity and inclusion, athletic skill, and financial need. Scholarsh ...

is named in his honor. For thirty-three years, Sanden had studios on the eleventh and then tenth floors of the South Studio Tower of

Carnegie Hall Carnegie Hall ( ) is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. It is at 881 Seventh Avenue (Manhattan), Seventh Avenue, occupying the east side of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street (Manhattan), 56th and 57th Street (Manhatta ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, and in

Ridgefield, Connecticut Ridgefield is a town in Fairfield County, Connecticut Connecticut () is the southernmost state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York ...

. On May 31, 2012, Sanden's official White House portraits of former President

George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...

and First Lady

Laura Bush Laura Lane Welch Bush (''née'' Welch; born November 4, 1946) is an American teacher, librarian, memoirist and author who was First Lady of the United States from 2001 to 2009. Bush previously served as First Lady of Texas from 1995 to 2000. ...

were unveiled.

Personal life and death

Sanden died on December 24, 2022, at the age of 87.

References

External links

*
Portrait Institute
1935 births 2022 deaths 20th-century American male artists 20th-century American painters 21st-century American painters American male painters American portrait painters Art Students League of New York faculty Artists from Austin, Texas Minneapolis College of Art and Design alumni Painters from Texas {{US-painter-1930s-stub