To read all the press about the international success painter Dean Mitchell has gained from an early age, one would think he never suffered through a “starving artist” period. Born in 1957 and raised in Quincy, Fla., Mitchell found so much acceptance and support of his work in his late teens that he was able to collect enough in sales, competition prize money, scholarships and grants to attend the Columbus College of Art and Design in Ohio. Upon graduation in 1980, at the age of 23, he found work with a little greeting-card company called Hallmark.

“My mother was thrilled I had a real job,” he says, because she had warned him that a black man would never be able to make a living selling pictures. In spite of her admonition, even once he reached Kansas City, he kept signing up for and winning contests, one being the prestigious T.H. Saunders exhibit in London where he was awarded Best of Show. Tensions arose at work because of Mitchell’s acclaim, however, and he soon found himself out of a job and living alone in a tiny apartment off Armour Boulevard.

“All I had was a box springs, a mattress, and my drawing table,” Mitchell says. The man who now owns a T-shirt that says, “Real artists don’t starve,” dedicated all his energy to not starving, and found he was marketable enough to support himself without a “day” job. Today, Mitchell has won over 400 awards, and his watercolors, oils and acrylics sell for anywhere from $2,000 to $50,000. R. Crosby Kemper Jr. is a particular fan and in ARTnews recommended Mitchell’s work for collectors.

Highlights of Mitchell’s career include an invitation to the White House Millennium party and his current collaboration with Maya Angelou on a Limited Edition book of her poems and his original hand-pulled etchings. Despite all his achievements, though, Mitchell doesn’t equate feat with finance. “I always knew I would be successful,” he says, “but I never thought I would make any money.”

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