A small strip of woods behind his boyhood home in a Minneapolis suburb provided the surroundings in which Jim Rataczak (pronounced “RAT-a-check”) began his life as a naturalist and artist. As a kindergartner, Jim, with great encouragement from his parents, was already drawing and painting pictures of the birds he regularly saw around his home. Then, at the age of 9, Jim and his family moved to a rural Minnesota lake and he suddenly had the natural world all around him. Here, what had for him been a strong interest in nature grew into a full-fledged passion as he made countless explorations around the family home.

As his desire to learn about nature grew, and birds became an increasingly common subject in his artwork, Jim learned of the work of several Minnesota wildlife painters who were known across the country for their vivid and dramatic portrayals of nature. He voraciously studied their work, especially that of Ron Van Gilder, Gary Moss, and David Maass, and marveled at the incredible animal diorama backgrounds Francis L. Jaques had painted at the Bell Museum of Natural History in Minneapolis.

Jim decided to enter the University of Notre Dame to study art, but soon found himself drawn instead to science, and he graduated with a degree in Biology in 1987. A Masters Degree, for conducting research in bird behavior, followed from the University of Michigan, and Jim assumed he was on his way to career in biology. However, a summer Fellowship at the famous Delta Waterfowl Research Station in Manitoba, Canada, exposed Jim to Delta’s rich artistic heritage and he realized that he wanted to get back into painting, perhaps even to devote his life to it.

This idea met with approval from Jim’s wife, Joan, and so a corner of their one-bedroom apartment in Chicago became a “studio”. While Joan’s nursing career paid their way,. Jim zealously pursued his art, taking classes at the Art Institute of Chicago, and learning bird anatomy at the Field Museum of Natural History where he painted and prepared bird skins for the museum’s collection. Most significantly, however, it was during this time that Jim unearthed what has proven to be an almost religious devotion to field sketching birds and nature. This direct approach to study and painting was further cemented as Jim began studying the work of Louis Agassiz Fuertes and became inspired by the work of Swedish artists Bruno Liljefors and Lars Jonsson.

In 1993, Jim and Joan moved back to Minnesota, where Jim continued his studies, and slowly began to exhibit his work. Continued fieldwork, and an annual critique group gathering (with several of the same artists whose work he studied as a youngster) has fostered the continued emergence of Jim’s own painting style. Today, his work can be found at the Snooty Fox Gallery in Annandale, MN, Wild Wings Gallery in Lake City, MN, and Krom’s Natural Images in Rochester, MN.  Further, Jim's paintings hang in private collections across North America, and in the Bell Museum of Natural History in Minneapolis. His work appeared in Wildlife Art magazine, Delta Waterfowl Report, Upland Hunter’s Almanac, Minnesota Birding, and throughout the pages of Doug Larsen’s recent books Don’t Shoot the Decoys and The Duck Gods Must Be Crazy.

On Conservation

“My passion for learning about nature has taken me across North America and on excursions to Mexico and the Caribbean. Years of field observation have galvanized my philosophy that all things in nature are connected, and that they reflect the pressures of their particular environments. Thus, in my paintings, I hope to portray my subjects as parts of, rather than apart from, their surroundings. Such connections have led me to become an ardent conservationist, and I hope to use my art to make people take a second look at nature. Taking that extra look, I believe, will cause people to realize that we still have incredible natural treasures all around us, from the most remote spots on the earth to our own backyards. Today, Joan, our three children, and I are blessed to have a backyard filled with the natural treasures that provide the inspiration for so many of my paintings.”

On Painting

“First-hand field observations (and my resultant sketches) of birds and nature provide the inspiration for my paintings. The longer I go between meaningful interactions with nature, the staler I become in the studio. Seeing and sketching things directly, I get to witness the stories as they unfold, and that energizes me. I also see the colors and light more clearly, and this greatly helps me interpret any photographs I may refer to later. Location studies also force a quick, and therefore more intuitive, application of the paint that results in a more individual painting.

I love the character and textures of paint, and all the technical approaches that exist for applying it. I have no desire for confusion between my paintings and photographs. Indeed, I want viewers of my work to know and enjoy that my pictures are created from paint, to be aware of the brushstrokes and canvas. To me, a successful painting is one that fosters this awareness and at the same time releases in the viewer the feeling that they are seeing the scene for themselves, first-hand, in nature.

Finally, many of my paintings portray a sense of quiet and calm, and I think that stems from my own need for these qualities in my day-to-day life. I am not, by nature, a person who gravitates toward rushed situations, and, while I enjoy my relationships with other people, I nonetheless relish long periods of time alone. Indeed, I look at my very fortunate life not in terms of the pursuit of achievements or awards, but as a collection of experiences to be savored and learned from.”