Jon Leafstedt grew up as a child in Iowa in the 1970’s. Jon fondly recalls endless expanses of land & sky from the back seat of his parents car on the long country drives to his grandparents river-valley farm. This memory is deeply rooted in his love for long horizons and his fantasy of the “other” place he imagined, out there, in a world he hoped to one day explore.
Encouraged to pursue a business degree at university, Jon followed in the footsteps of his Swedish grandfather, focusing his electives on art courses to balance creativity with commerce. Over the next three decades, he led major retail organizations, including Esprit de Corp, NIKE, Williams-Sonoma, and Scandinavian Designs, always carving out time on weekends to paint.
Today, Jon lives on a hillside property in Sonoma, where he has converted an old barn into his creative art studio. His present work pivots on one central theme…the powerful geometry of long & linear lines rooted in his childhood. For Jon, horizons equal possibility and a promise of new beginnings. Through multiple narratives of both abstracted land and seascapes, his work visually and emotionally takes the viewer to a restful place where their eyes can wander with the expanse of each painting and wonder what lays on the horizon for them. Jon would like for every viewer to see his horizons as a place of self-discovery and encouragement to move forward with an openness to the unknown.
