About Elvis Swift

OUR PRINTS

Our prints are reproductions of original artwork created by Elvis Swift, employing state-of-the-art printing methods with large format Aqueous printers. The prints are museum-quality, using archival inks with the finest papers, canvas, and equipment available anywhere.

OUR PRODUCTS

Mr. Swift designs and makes many of our products. Some are manufactured for us from a variety of sources. We are sourcing our materials primarily from the U.S.A., and in some cases, we take the ‘Marco Polo’ approach by finding the best of worldwide suppliers. Our desire is to provide thoughtful pictures and practical items for use in your daily lives. Things that might remind you of someone or something from your past, a remembrance that brings joy. That’s our goal.

OUR PROMISE

Our Promise to you, our customers, is to serve you happily and swiftly, to make your time with us an enjoyable experience. Please let us know how we are doing in this regard. Great care is exercised in the production of our prints, products, and in our service, but absolute perfection is not guaranteed.

Thank you for visiting us. From all of us at ELVIS SWIFT Dry Goods & Supply – Objets D’art and Other Stuff

Oh, check out his Pinterest and Google Elvis Swift too!

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In the middle of the 20th century, Elvis Swift was born to parents of modest means in a small town in the western United States. Little is known of his early years. As a young man, he was considered a dreamer, doodler, and layabout. Ironically, Swift emerged as an internationally acclaimed illustrator, craftsman, and fine artist. The reclusive Swift spends most of his time working in his rock garden and is rarely seen in public.

Additionally, he attended art school long ago in Milwaukee, WI, Layton School of Art & Design, specializing in Fine Arts. He studied the expected prerequisite courses, drawing, painting, sculpture, and printmaking. He discovered in the process his particular fondness for drawing and printmaking. Layton closed and shut their doors for financial reasons while attending the school after his second year. After Layton’s closing, with a portfolio of drawings and prints, Elvis journeyed to Minneapolis to further his art education, applying to and being accepted at Minneapolis College of Art & Design. There, he continued to pursue drawing and printmaking.

Mr. Swift added an illustration class to his curriculum and found he had a knack for drawing in that fashion – commercial illustration. Before completing his degree in art, a local art studio offered a job to Elvis, and he decided to leave school and begin work as a commercial artist. The art studio’s work suited him well, and he soon found that product illustration was intriguing and lucrative. Elvis spent many years illustrating, in ink and pencil, many thousands of products for manufacturers of goods and newspaper product drawings for numerous major retail department stores.

His father greatly influenced Mr. Swift. When he was a small boy, his dad would set him on his knee and draw fanciful ink drawings for his amusement. They were always cheerful little doodles of men going about their duties in amusing situations, often accompanied by a title or description of what they were about. Also, several other artists were influential – at least, he admired them. Among them is Al Hirschfeld, who was a remarkable artist drawing caricatures of famous people. Another of his most admired artists is Marc Chagall.

Looking back through the years, art and drawing were just about all that Elvis ever took seriously. In his off time, he likes to listen to and play the blues guitar, tinker with bicycles, and ride motorcycles. Today, Elvis spends each day at his drawing table, continuing to draw in pencil and ink; most ideas begin in his sketchbook, which is always in his back pocket, and conclude in some form of ink on paper.

Elvis Swift’s perspective on calligraphy is as unique as his art. He prefers to think of it as ‘handwriting’ rather than ‘calligraphy,’ hoping it resembles a casual, honest jotting down of thoughts, much like his father’s drawings that captivated him as a young boy. This unconventional approach to calligraphy is a reflection of his artistic philosophy, which values authenticity and spontaneity over formality and structure.

In closing, Elvis does have a favorite quote, written by ‘The Preacher’: ‘There is no new thing under the sun.’

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