About Larry

August 30, 1939 - February 8, 2020 

 Larry Casso grew up in historic and colorful New Orleans, Louisiana. He studied Fine and Commercial Art at the John McCrady Art School, mastering the Traditional style of art that emphasizes detail and realism. Upon graduation his commercial art skills were effectively used in the aerospace and defense industries where he did extensive illustrations of the Saturn IB, the booster that launched the first moon rocket out of its Earth orbit toward the moon. Larry went on to train with General Electric and operate the first computer-oriented drawing device ever created. While his career as a commercial artist blossomed, Larry continued longing to express himself in the arena of Fine Art.

In 1973, Larry founded the Baton Rouge Fine Arts Academy. There he taught the Classical, or Old Masters’ method of painting that emphasizes the basics of Drawing, Shading, Composition and Color Theory. He has taught close to 50,000 students from all over the world, many of whom are professional artists today. In addition to teaching, Larry served as Art Director for magazines such as The Heart of Baton Rouge and the Internationally distributed Manifest. His work is in private, public and corporate collections worldwide. His art gallery of original work can be viewed here. 

Larry Casso was a skilled art instructor teaching the principles of drawing, shading, composition and color theory. He worked in numerous mediums - oils, acrylics, charcoal, pastel, watercolor, egg tempera, pencil and mixed media. His loves were pencil sketching using the pencil broadside technique as well as watercolor of which he was a master. His abilities to paint loose wet on wet techniques as well as refined detailed compositions put him in a league few others could match. He was a strong believer in completing black and white studies prior to putting color on paper. Even towards the end of his career, he continued this practice. See his fine art collections below. 

"Color gets the glory, values do the work"

The term "Imagineering" was not invented by Larry Casso, but one he used repeatedly to describe his own work and was a constant inspiration.  He often said "Imagination is not about painting; it is about seeing". The work above is a good example of imagineering in the creation of fine art. The original photo was 11 x 14 inches. Mr. Casso used about 1 square inch of the information and then only about 50% of that. He SAW the dark gondolas linked to the sunlight building and made that the center of interest leaving a good part of other information out. The rest he left to the viewer's imagination.