Windham Independent 2004

An officer and an artist

Bruce Coffin plans to leave his career as a cop one day to turn his love for painting into a full time job

By Steven Kerrick

Bruce Coffin is a police detective and fine artist. The 20 year Portland Police Department veteran and Windhamite has combined two disciplines in his life that allow him to express himself in very different ways.

Coffin, 40, has been painting and drawing his whole life, but started taking his art seriously 11 years ago.

"It was one of those things where your wife tells you to get off the couch and stop talking about something," he said. "On weekends or if there was bad weather, I'd watch that guy with the big hair, Bob Ross, on Channel 10 like everybody did. I'd see him use a house paintbrush and think if he can do that with that, I know I can do this."

So Coffin said he took money from a Christmas bonus, signed up for art classes, bought supplies and just started painting.

The cop said he chose to paint because he felt it would be a good way to combat the stress of his day job. "You can only go running so much," he said.

While it may have started as a cathartic exercise, Coffin's art has become a central part of his life.

"Now I paint because I have to," he said. "I try to paint in photo-realistic style and that's pretty much what people come to me for." He primarily works from photographs. Much of his work is commission based so his subject matter varies.

The police detective said it's particularly difficult to paint a deceased relative.

"Unlike being able to paint a pet or a child or something that you could actually go over and spend a few hours with, you never knew them," said Coffin. "You try and make sure that instead of just copying a photograph, you can learn enough through different things so you get a better feel of what the person was like."

When he's not working on a commissioned piece, Coffin said he paints whatever jumps out at him. "You just decide right then. It grabs you and that's what you want to paint. It's all you think about until you get the process going," he said.

Coffin primarily works in oils, although he also uses watercolors and dabbles in pencil and acrylic. "I think one helps you with the other," he said. However, the bottom line is he uses what the customer wants, he said.

He's currently showing at the Little Sebago Gallery on Roosevelt Trail. Earlier this year he had his first solo show at the Casco Bay Gallery in Portland. At the opening of that show, the Windham artist said he was approached by the owner of Blacksmith's Winery, who had been looking for original art for a bottle of cabernet sauvignon. "He had seen a painting I was using to promote the show and wanted to buy it to use on the label. I was floored," said Coffin, who counts the wine label as one of his proudest achievements.

When he retires from police work he wants to paint full time.

"I'm dying for this," the detective said. He said he often gets up in the middle of the night to paint, and keeps working until it's time to leave for his full-time job. Coffin estimates he spends 20 hours a week painting. "I've actually taken vacations so that I could do nothing but paint," he said.

"I've done a lot of things already that I didn't think I would ever do," he said. "If I can do it (paint) and make a living doing it, continue to make people happy by what it is that I'm painting, and make myself happy, then I'm successful."

Bruce Coffin's art can currently be seen at the Little Sebago Gallery & Frame at 765 Roosevelt Trail, or at his Web site www.coffincreations.com.

Windham Independent December 2004-