russell_chatham
PEOPLE: Russell Chatham, who descended from turn-of-the-century California landscape painters, said he grew up associating art-making with poverty. “I had to grit my teeth and accept that I was going to be dirt poor my whole life,” he said.   David Briggs

When I met him for this interview, Russell Chatham—painter, printmaker, author, fisherman and restauranteur—gave me a short piece he wrote titled, “Advice for a Young Artist,” which recommends that aspiring artists reject institutions, especially those that claim to teach or promote art. It also urges artists to remember “that you are a sworn enemy of the state and all manifestations of the Establishment.” And though he writes that the number of people in America who…