Tad Trimnell was born in Kalamazoo, Michigan, the third son of John and Elaine Trimnell.
He is the only one of his immediate family born outside New Jersey and was nearly named Francesco, after his grandfather who originated from Messina, Sicily.
His family was temporarily transferred to Michigan but would visit South Jersey often -- realizing only later that the transfer back would never happen.
Bored and unmotivated in school, the young Tad Trimnell found a haven in creating art, and his interest soon blossomed at an early age.
His preferred subjects were that of the human form and face, whose complexities he found an intriguing and welcome challenge.
In his senior year of high school, he received a full scholarship to attend Southwestern Michigan College, concentrating on his passion for art.
After attending SMC for one year, he transferred to a college in the Chicagoland area.
It was there that his colored pencil and graphite figurative studies began to excel, winning nearly all the awards given at student competitions for three years. Despite success in his artistic and athletic endeavors, Tad grew increasingly bothered by certain political and philosophical differences he had with the administration of the college.
Eleven credits shy of graduation, he decided to return to Michigan.
Throughout the next few years, Tad worked a variety of jobs, including postal clerk, customer service rep., and at a plastics factory in order to finance his artistic endeavors.
He dabbled in ceramic sculpture and later reinvented himself with a new type of painting style: a nonrepresentational abstract concept using thick layers of gesso, mixed media, and numerous oil glazes he calls sculpture painting.
Feeling a sense of rejuvenation, he returned to school, taking independent study courses at Western Michigan University.
Childhood memories of the Jersey shore, the struggles of life thus far, and his ideals of independence served as his artistic inspiration.
With a passion for abstract expressionism, he honed his painting style and completed his B.A. in Art.
One year passed and Tad took a job cooking and managing at a brand new restaurant named R. Stanley’s Diner.
There he gained knowledge of the culinary arts and joined this new vision, creating and managing at the diner for six years.
The diner became a refuge, a piece of artwork in and of itself. It was while working there that he began a three-dimensional mural, using signature painting techniques and incorporating surrealism in favor of nonrepresentationalism.
Upon completion, the mural was hung in the diner and became a centerpiece to which employees and customers alike were drawn.
Despite heavy financial, physical, and emotional struggles (including the sudden, tragic loss of his father), Tad prides himself on his confidence and concentration.
He now takes each day as a time for creation, integrating all of his thoughts of the past -- of what he’s felt and what he’s known -- combining that with the present in order to change his future.
He believes in pouring his soul out and into the painting itself, using only two hands and one brush.