Chas Downs
Nautical and Aviation Art. Talented Howard County painter Chas Downs depicts local scenes like the ships found in Baltimore Harbor. His acrylic paintings are rendered in meticulous detail. Art Partners is proud to present a selection of his high quality Iris Giclee prints in several sizes.
“Born in Fayetteville, NC, Chas has lived most of his life in Maryland, and graduated from the University of Maryland with a BA and MA in History. He makes his home in Glenelg, Howard County, Maryland, where he lives with his wife Kathleen and a pair of cats.
He served in the United States Air Force from 1969 to 1972, stationed in Texas and Okinawa. While a member of the Air Force Security Service, he accumulated 1400 hours flying on electronic reconnaissance missions in Southeast Asia.
A career archivist with the National Archives and Records Administration, he began there in 1976 as a part-time archives technician in the Diplomatic Branch. After a stint in declassification, he became archivist in charge of the research room at the Washington National Records Center at Suitland, Maryland. He has been assistant branch chief in two branches, a supervisory archivist for Print Archives, head of the Library and Printed Archives Branch, headquarters staff archivist for the Regional Archives System, and was a senior appraisal archivist in the Life Cycle Management Division, until he retired in January 2005.
He then began volunteering at the National Archives facility, College Park, MD. He also volunteered at the College Park Aviation Museum, devoting his energies to their archival collections and does historical research. A collection of his paintings of historic aircraft has been displayed at the Museum. He is a long-time member of the Society for History in the Federal Government, and serves as its Archivist and photographer. In 2009, he received an award recognizing his service to the Society.
As an artist, Chas prefers acrylics to other media, usually painting on gessoboard. As an aviation buff, he has always loved to draw aircraft, especially those of the “Golden Age” between WWI and WWII. His aviation paintings are based on meticulous research in aviation museums and archival sources, and often illustrate incidents that did or could have happened. Recently, his painting of a Stinson Reliant was sold at the Howard County Arts Council Silent Auction. He also enjoys painting nautical subjects, especially historic vessels, lighthouses, and seabirds. A number of his paintings are available as iris giclee prints of various sizes."
You can learn more about him, and his work, at his website: www.chasdowns.com.
See examples of his work below:
