Dave Z has always been drawing. From the start, he has pulled images from his imagination and also observed the motion and emotion from life, filled a thousand sketchbooks, and can always be found with a drawing pen in his pocket and blank pages nearby. He has been a professional at this for twenty years and has shown his art in shows nationally and internationally.
As a former Disney Animator, Dave contributed his talents to such modern classics as Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, Pocahontas, The Lion King, Hercules, Fantasia 2000, and many others as part of the second Golden Era of Animation.
Dave teaches workshops on creativity to artists and others and his family workshop, Wondrous Stories, is a fun-filled weekend of writing children's stories with your children. He has taught and lectured at UCLA, USC, Art Center College of Design, Disney, Sony and Esalen Institute among others. He has been the featured artist for several years at Esalen for their fundraising events, and he is also the featured artist for the organization Humanity Unites Brilliance, a global humanitarian entrepreneurial network.
He has designed logos for corporations and individuals, done portraits of famous folks as well as friends, and created commissioned images for clients. With acclaimed speaker and world's leading gerontology expert, Dr. Ken Dychtwald, along with Ken's wife Maddy and Dave's daughter Grace, he co-wrote and illustrated a magical children's book about transformation entitled Gideon's Dream- A tale of new beginnings. Dave illustrated Dr. Deepak Chopra's first children's book, You With The Stars In Your Eyes.
Dave lives with his wife Robin, who is his Muse, their brilliant daughter Grace, the perfect dog, Rosie and a tortoise named Sweetheart on a small ranchette in the horse country of Chatsworth, California. Dave makes art mostly from his studio and alchemical laboratory (la-BOR-a-tory) twenty steps from his house.
