A former sports photographer who worked behind the camera for more than three decades is the featured artist during The Finer Arts Gallery’s “Art Affaire” event this month.

But rather than photographs, Dennis Desprois will exhibit his rich, colorful acrylic paintings of women he has met or observed. The gallery is located inside the historic Treehouse building, at 6137 E. Cave Creek Road, in Cave Creek. The free event starts at 5 p.m. Friday, Jan. 17.

Admission is free.

A Vietnam veteran, Desprois was a Major League Baseball and NFL photographer for more than 30 years before becoming a full-time artist. Painting in acrylics, his subjects include ballerinas, Art Deco women, Fauvist landscapes, three-dimensional reverse perspectives which appear to move, and his recent series of “vanishing” women, who recede into the background.

Desprois grew up in Oregon and attended a small Catholic high school.

“I was the kid in class who could draw better than everyone else,” Desprois said. “I started painting when I was a senior in high school. Painting and drawing have always come naturally to me.”

After high school, he joined the Air Force. He was stationed at a small radar site in northern California that had a base photography hobby shop where he learned to develop film and make black and white prints.

Later, while stationed at an Air Force base in northern Thailand, he bought his first Nikon camera.

After the war, he got a job with the San Francisco Giants parking buses. He caught a lucky break when the Giants’ public relations manager gave him a photographer’s pass so he could shoot game action. At the end of the season, the PR manager bought several prints.

“Ballerina in Pink Tutu” by Dennis Desprois.

(Photo provided by The Finer Arts Gallery)

“Hooray for the Red, White & Blue” by Dennis Desprois.

(Photo provided by The Finer Arts Gallery)

“The following season I was asked to film players so they could see batting mistakes they were making,” he said. “My job responsibilities expanded to the department lead, where I oversaw all the Giants’ printing, graphics, photography and coaching videos. At the same time, I was one of the two 49ers official photographers and an NFL photographer covering several championship games and Super Bowls.”

Desprois moved to Scottsdale in 1990 and turned his focus to painting. A self-taught artist, he prefers working with acrylic paints rather than oils.

He often paints women whom he has met or observed, and sometimes they are part of his imagination. For example, last summer he spent some time in New England painting farmhouses, covered bridges and other scenes, and he included a woman somewhere in each painting.

Whether he is painting women or another subject, he enjoys painting with bold, bright colors.

“I have tried a few times to mute my colors, but it always looks like something that would be hanging in a motel room,” he said.

Visitors to The Finer Arts Gallery will find diverse paintings, drawings, sculpture, mixed media, photography, glass, wood, fiber, ceramics, jewelry, and other original work.

Call 480-488-2923 or visit www.thefinerartsgallery.com.

“Evening Beach Ride” by Dennis Desprois.

(Photo provided by The Finer Arts Gallery)