Drawing and painting became a regular activity for Bruce Horn while growing up in Circleville, Ohio. The art instruction he received and the visits to art museums as a youngster were important influences. While attending Miami University, he started working with the printmaking techniques. Bruce received a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Miami University in 1968 and worked for a brief time as a package designer. His studies continued at Ohio State University where he earned a Master of Fine Arts degree in 1970. The abstract artwork he created during the intervening years was executed primarily with color intaglio techniques. After returning to oil painting and a representational style in 1985, he took additional classes through the Scottsdale Artists' School and the Fechin Institute.

A career as an art educator began for Horn in 1970 at Blackburn College in Illinois. In 1972, he accepted a faculty position at Northern Arizona University where he is an emeritus Professor of Art. The painting program was his primary responsibility but he also taught a variety of courses in etching, lithography, serigraphy, woodcut, drawing, composition and color theory. His artwork has been included in over two hundred professional exhibitions. In addition to local and regional shows, his artwork has been displayed in national, juried exhibitions throughout the United States. His color intaglio prints were also included in international juried shows. Bruce has had numerous solo exhibits and his artwork has been included in many private and public art collections.

While talking about his ideas and influences, Bruce Horn states that “My artwork has, quite naturally, become transformed from an essentially, cerebral activity to something more process oriented. There is an innate deception in the mental justification we use to validate art. For me, the preoccupation with content and innovation in art eventually gave way to the simple, intuitive act of engaging the creative process. My motivation comes from the humbling challenge of painting the subtle and elusive effects of light. Paintings that display a skilled, yet irreverently playful manipulation of paint and brush are of particular interest to me; they are evidence of a unique, creative moment. The virtuoso paintings of Anders Zorn, Antonio Mancini, Joaquin Sorolla and John Singer Sargent are often flawlessly causal. Their paintings effortlessly seem to combine the best of Impressionist color and light with the best of academic drawing and painting technique. They convey something authentic about the creative process as it relates to real life in fleeting time.”

A retrospective exhibition of Horn’s paintings, prints and drawings was hosted by Northern Arizona University in 2001. Recently, paintings have been included in the Oil Painters of America, Western Region exhibition at the Waterhouse Gallery in Santa Barbara, California and the National Fine Art Competition, Morro Bay Art Association, in California. A solo exhibition titled “Paris and Normandy” was shown at the Hudgens Gallery of Fine Art in 2006. Bruce lives with his wife Pat in Flagstaff, Arizona, where he now paints as a full-time artist.