About the artist

Peter Layne Arguimbau is an American painter, restorer and historian of classical art. Layne’s subject matter includes portraits, animals, and landscapes, but is best known for his classical marines. 

Layne’s father, Vincent, was a portrait painter who started to develop his son’s skills at an early age. In 1958 a colleague of Vincent’s from the Art Student’s League, Frank Mason came to the Arguimbau’s home to share a paint formula known as the Maroger Medium, all under Layne’s watchful eye. The Maroger Medium was an oily-resinous gel that set the paint up instantly, and was the closest reproduction to date of the lost varnishes of the Old Masters. Following this nascent realization, Frank Mason became his teacher and lifelong mentor, in the pursuit to master the techniques of Flemish painting, and now paints in the style of the Hudson River School and more specifically the Luminists painters that followed.  

Born in Darien, Connecticut in 1951, Layne and his family lived between Scotts Cove and Seville, Spain. After attending Loomis Chaffee and Vassar College, Layne continued his study for a total of 14 years under Frank Mason at the Art Students League of New York. Layne then traveled abroad for a two- year classical study of the Baroque Era in Florence, Rome, and Naples, as well as Hellenistic Classicism in Athens, Olympia, and Delphi. Consequently, he continued to copy paintings from the old masters from museums throughout Europe and America. He learned the techniques of the old masters by copying paintings from museums throughout Europe and America. 

After a decade spent testing recipes from medieval manuscripts with restorer Pierro Mannoni, Layne continues to grind his colors from powdered pigments and cooks his mediums without relying on the industry’s rudimentary products. This keen interest on technique has evolved into a book—“Rembrandt’s Lost Secret. The focus of his life’s work has been applying his skill through his love of portraying nature’s subtle and dramatic light effects of sky and reflections over sea from sunrise to sunset. He lectures on the oil technique of painting and how glazing with the gel mediums can capture the luminescence of prismatic light.