Sure brush strokes lend the artist’s works a photographic look tempered with an Impressionistic softness.

In addition to his murals and fine-art pieces, Cheply at times works with designers who hire him to apply faux treatments on walls. An interior design degree from Arizona State University gave him the background to execute a variety of wall finishes. While in school, his involvement with set design added another layer of experience.

The artist’s studio speaks of this man’s many interests. One wall holds a collection of 33 rpm records that he sometimes plays as he paints. Among his favorites are songs by The Beatles and Jethro Tull. Neatly shelved books include Gray’s Anatomy, architectural tomes, design and drafting books, works by famous and not-so-famous artists, and catalogs from museums that he and his wife of 20 years, Beth, have visited. “That’s our common denominator . . . art. Beth is a talented photographer whose arena is the darkroom, whereas mine is everything else,” he chuckles.

It is overwhelmingly apparent from viewing his art and from speaking with him that Cheply’s strongest inspiration is nature—and it has been so for a long time. When he and his brother were youngsters on Long Island, New York, they both suffered from asthma. During periods when they were unable to go to school or play outdoors, their parents gave them books, many of which were related to nature. “It was something to keep our minds active, and I was always drawing something,” he remembers.

Growing up on the East Coast, Cheply says the Hudson River School was one of his earliest influences. This mid-19th-century American art movement, initiated by a group of landscape painters, had a Romantic aesthetic vision. The artists’ subjects were the Hudson River Valley and surrounding mountains. They saw the American landscape as a pastoral setting, where human beings and nature coexist peacefully.

Some of these painters made their way from the East Coast to the Southwest, taking new inspiration from the wide-open spaces they never had experienced. Cheply sees himself of similar mind, noting: “Once you have an appreciation for your environment, if you really are in tune with nature, it doesn’t matter where you are. You take that appreciation with you.”