WALLACE WYSS (rhymes with Reese): A native of Detroit, his first intro to art as a child was seeing the fabulous Diego Rivera murals of Ford Motor Co. in the Detroit Institute of Arts.
Wyss started college as an art major but switched over to journalism after an ad man came to the school recruiting writers. Working first as an ad copywriter,Wyss later wrote for Motor Trend and Car & Driver before authoring 18 car books.
Art re-entered his life in 2009, when he made an oil portrait of Shelby to promote his new biography of Carroll Shelby. He took the book and painting to a car show and sold both--so , on the way home, Wyss decided to re-enter the art world.
His media: acrylic oils on canvas. His style? Photorealism originally, now edging into impressionistic. His goal? After 40 years of shooting pictures of cars with no people around, he says "for 2023 I'm going to work people into my paintings. They can be part of the story. My favorite is a Cobra being tuned in 1964 by two mechanics I got to know well when writing the Shelby bio."
