At the age of six, Phil Austin decided he was going to be an artist. From his boyhood years in Waukegan, Illinois, through college at the University of Michigan and two years at the American Academy of Art in Chicago, he kept to his single-minded goal. For more than twenty-five years following his training, he worked at various art jobs in Chicago, starting as a paste-up artist and soon becoming a freelance illustrator, working for such clients as the Chicago Sun Times, United Airlines and the Children’s Book Press.

In the early 1970’s Austin and his wife, Edwina, abandoned big city life in favor of picturesque Door County, Wisconsin, a scenic peninsula jutting out into Lake Michigan to form Green Bay on its western shore. In this invigorating environment, he devoted himself full time to his favorite pursuit: painting watercolors. He has taught more than fifty watercolor workshops across the nation.1

In the early 1980’s, he was asked by North Light Publishing Company to produce a book on his methods of watercolor. The book is titled Capturing Mood in Watercolor. It has been highly successful and Austin was asked to redo it for a second edition in 1988.2

1Austin, Phil, Capturing Mood in Watercolor, North Light Publishing, Cincinnati: 1984.
2www.worthpoint.com