An award-winning painter of figures depicting black middle and lower class people and landscapes from his southern background and other personal experiences, Dean Mitchell is inspired by grizzled laborers, time-worn elderly faces, and persons like himself who have lived in a segregated environment. His career hit an upswing 2002 when art critic Michael Kimmelman wrote in The New York Times that Mitchell was 'a virtual modern-day Vermeer'.

Dean Mitchell was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania but grew up in Quincy, Florida, a tobacco growing town. His mother, Hazel, was unmarried and worked as a dietician, and he was basically raised by his grandmother who encouraged his art talent and who bought him paints from the time he was a ...