Canada-born and Utah-raised artist W. Royden Card (BFA ’76, MFA ’79) was once on an errand in Salt Lake City when he stopped on the sidewalk beside a homeless man and a rich man, all three transfixed by the indescribable beauty of the sky. So powerful was this moment that the homeless man said, “Okay, God, I’ll stop complaining.” Card loves how beauty can connect people, and since age 10 he knew he needed to interpret the beauty that he sees for others.
Card has a deep love for the hues of high-desert landscapes. He taught printmaking at BYU for 16 years, but he’s painted the desert for more than 50 and has made Southern Utah his home. Although he humbly suggests he was given “more desire than talent,” he has amassed a body of work that ranges from woodcuts and paintings to poetry and prose (see roydencardfineart.com). Of his style he says, “I simply paint the beauty I see and what I’d like others to see.”
