Troy PaivaBy

Michael Brow-Sparks

Troy Paiva has been an artist all his life. From sitting in the back row in grade school and drawing cars and airplanes on his notebooks to the freelance design of mass market toy products for major corporations like Hasbro,

Wham-o! and Mattel.

• As a child, taking several trips through the desert opened Troy’s eyes to the great beauty of the American Southwest.

• As a teenager, he would take two or three day, 2000 mile drives through the vast desert wastelands with a group of friends, he always volunteered to take the late night driving shifts and watched with fascination and amazement, all the abandoned roadside buildings and deserted towns.

• It wasn’t until his late 20’s, that Paiva picked up photography as a new way to be creative.

• It wasn’t until the late 80’s until Troy discovered the mysterious beauty of night photography.

Night Photography

• Troy Pavia’s night pictures were all done on scene. No digitally enhanced, or any type of darkroom tricks were involved.

• Over the last few years, Paiva’s photos began to pop up in exhibitions and in magazines like “Yahoo Magazine”,”Popular Photography”, and even on several rock band CD covers.

• Pavia also has pictures on a few Stephen King books as well, such as “Christine” and “Mile 81”.

Lost America

• Tory Paiva created his Photography website “Lost America” in 1998.• His website features a lot of his brilliant, but haunting and mysterious photos.

Published Books

• Paiva has 2 published books so far.• Night Vision: The Art of Urban Exploration

• Lost America: The Abandoned Roadside West

Troy Paiva Interview on British TV show Artland

• http://youtu.be/pMQPY0Ll4ko

Work Cited

• http://youtu.be/pMQPY0Ll4ko• http://lostamerica.com/• http://www.pixiport.com/BIO-PAIVA.htm