About the Artist Explorer
My compass has always been curiosity.
I believe art is a form of navigation. It’s the process of looking at the familiar world—the surface of the water, the structure of a bone, the lines on a map—and finding the hidden currents of meaning that connect everything. My work is not about creating a picture; it’s about charting a course and bringing back an artifact of that journey.
My training as an explorer began long before I ever picked up a brush. It started in the Florida Keys, learning to read the subtle language of the ocean. It was shaped by my heritage—a rich confluence of Irish, German, Spanish, and Cuban cultures that taught me there are many different maps to the same truth.
This same instinct for seeing the unseen is what led me to become a GIA Graduate Gemologist. For years, my work was to look inside a raw, unassuming stone and find the structure, clarity, and brilliance hidden within. I learned that the most profound beauty is often just beneath the surface, waiting for a patient eye to find it.
Today, I apply that same discipline to my art. My studio is my ship's cabin, and my subjects are my navigational charts.
This pursuit of knowledge recently led me on a pilgrimage to the heart of our shared visual history. I traveled to Amsterdam, Paris, and Rome not as a tourist, but as a student. Standing before the works of Rembrandt, Caravaggio, and the masters of antiquity, I wasn't just looking at paint on a canvas. I was studying the logbooks of the greatest navigators in art history, learning the timeless techniques they used to chart the complexities of the human soul.
What I brought back from that journey is a deeper conviction in my mission: to create art that serves as a guide.
The pieces I create—whether the symbol is a fish from my home in the Keys, a skull that speaks of legacy, or a compass rose from an ancient map—are artifacts of this ongoing exploration. They are not simply decorations. They are maps to meaning, intended to serve as beautiful, tangible reminders for you to navigate your own world with purpose and wonder.
This is the Art of Navigation. Thank you for being a part of the voyage.
— William DePaula
Artist William DePaula
William DePaula is an artist from Irish, German, Spanish and Cuban stock, and has been residing in the Florida Keys. From his early childhood onward, he has never stopped drawing, painting and creating. He envisions a world in which beauty is as important as function, where culture and history are respected, and where nature is at once powerful and vulnerable. Infusing an essence of life in all his paintings, DePaula understands beauty is accessible to all. DePaula's art has been featured in select art museums around the world.