Yurik Riegel was born in the small coastal town of Half Moon Bay, California. He received his first formal art training at the local high school. Though art was his first love, he also spent a great deal of his time away from class doing physical exercise. It was here in the vigorous physical training of running in the school’s Track and Cross Country teams and practicing the martial art of Hapkido, that the seeds of personal evolution first took root in his soul.
Yurik attended San Jose State University where he received a degree in Illustration. At the age of 22, after experiencing a panic attack, he began to read books on personal growth, why people suffer, and the relation of psychology to art. Upon graduation, he traveled across the U.S. in search of classical figurative training at the Arts Students League of New York City, under the instruction of Peter Cox, Greg Kreutz, and Michael Burban.
After returning to San Francisco, he was hired by his childhood inspiration, the Lucas companies. It was in this time period, in the wake of 911, that Yurik was more formerly introduced to the world of course work and meditation. He dove in and never looked back.
Yurik’s imagery speaks of the teachings of the Buddha,Werner Erhard, David Deada, Tony Robbins, Ekhart Tolle and many others. It also speaks to the growing trend in the world of urban tribalism, spirituality, and global connection. His oil paintings are an up-to-the minute reflection of modern man’s struggle to know himself in an Age of Information and Globalization.
Yurik still lives in the San Francisco Bay Area near his favorite city, paints, works as a personal coach, studies transformation, and races competitively on a local running team.