Riley Holloway is a Dallas-based artist whose dynamic portraits capture the faces of the world around him. A 2015 Hunting Prize finalist, he has attended The Art Institute of Dallas, the Florence Academy of Art, and the University of Texas in Arlington. In 2013, Holloway completed a unique residency at The Fairmont in Dallas, which was accompanied by a solo exhibition in the hotel’s gallery at the completion of his time there. He has been in a number of group exhibitions and repeatedly featured in solo exhibitions at Fort Works Art in Fort Worth. In addition, he completed a prominent public art mural commission for a municipal court building in downtown Fort Worth and was recently added to the Dean Collection, a contemporary art collection owned by hip hop producer Kasseem Dean (AKA Swizz Beatz) and his wife, singer-songwriter Alicia Keys.

I recently sat down with Riley at his studio in Dallas where we discussed growing up in an artistic home, studying in Florence, the impact of the right artist residency and what it’s like to have Sedrick Huckaby as your mentor.