Aaron Parazette is a celebrated American painter recognized for his bold use of color, razor-sharp geometry, and a visual language shaped equally by surf culture and West Coast minimalism. Born in Ventura, California in 1960 and raised near the beaches of Hermosa, Parazette’s early years spent surfing would become a lifelong influence—visible in the clean lines, wave-like rhythms, and sun-charged palettes that define his work.

He received his BFA in Painting from the University of South Florida and his MFA from Claremont Graduate University before moving to Houston in 1990 to join the Core Program at the Glassell School of Art. Houston quickly became home, and Parazette has since become a central figure in the city’s contemporary art landscape. He has been a professor of painting at the University of Houston since 1997, mentoring generations of emerging artists while continuing to develop a rigorous studio practice.

Parazette’s work spans text-based paintings, shaped canvases, and crisp hard-edge abstractions that merge precision with play. His early surf-slang paintings evolved into a highly refined vocabulary of geometric forms—swoops, arcs, diagonals, and color blocks arranged with architectural clarity. Over the past three decades, his practice has been featured in numerous solo and group exhibitions across the United States, including museum shows and major gallery presentations, and he was named Texas Artist of the Year by Art League Houston.

Today, Parazette continues to work from his Houston studio, creating paintings that balance discipline with joy, precision with movement, and fine-art seriousness with the laid-back spirit of the California coast. His pieces remain instantly recognizable: vibrant, exacting, and unmistakably his.