Sam Vokey was born in 1963 and was educated from Bowdoin College. Painting in the tradition of the Boston School, he studied at the R.H. Ives Gammell Studio in Boston from 1989-1994. While at the Gammell Studio, Vokey also worked privately with two of the senior Boston School artists, Robert Cormier and Robert Douglas Hunter. The classic training which he received during this period, with its emphasis on working directly from life and in natural light, is at the center of his painting style. Vokey's oils, whether still-lives or landscapes, constantly explore highly sophisticated balances both of overall composition and light and dark values within the composition. As with the style of his Boston School predecessors whom he had admired, he emulates both French Salon painting and French Impressionism in his approach. Vokey's technique crosses Realism with some of the softer edges and painterly qualities of Impressionism. To his technical skill, Vokey adds a fine eye for subject matter in the production of his astonishingly mature, sophisticated, and beautiful paintings.
Vokey, who has been designated a Copley Master, is a member of the Guild of Boston Artists and he won the Edmond Tarbell Award and the R.H. Ives Gammell Award. He was the cover artist for American Artist Magazine in April 2005. He has had four one-man shows at Tree's Place and has had a solo exhibition at the Copley Society of Boston (1993). In addition, Vokey has been in-group shows including Boston's St. Botolph Club (1990), the Fuller Museum in Brockton, MA (1991), and Tree's Place (1996). He has been featured in Cape Cod Life magazine (August 1998), and has placed works in major private and public collections, including the Cape Cod Museum of Art, Merrill Lynch, Bank of Boston, Henry Kravis, and former Presidents of both Ireland and Uruguay.