Don grew up in La Crosse along the Mississippi River. He spent much of his youth exploring the hills, valleys and riverbanks of the Driftless Area in southwest Wisconsin.Trained as a graphic artist at the Ringling College of Art in Sarasota, Florida, Don worked as anIndependent commercial artist in Milwaukee and San Francisco. In the 1970s he returned to his Midwest roots and launched an award-winning graphic art studio in the Twin Cities. Outside of his commercial work, he continued to pursue his passion for painting, participating in studio drawing groups, art crawls, corporate exhibits and local and national gallery shows.Upon retiring from commercial design in 2001, Don dedicated himself to painting fulltime until his passing in 2022. A gifted natural artist, his paintings hang in homes throughout the Twin Cities and nationally. His legacy is a library of plein air oil paintings, watercolors, and figure drawings.