GERALD LEVEY is a widely recognized marine artist whose work is characterized by its salty ambiance and authenticity. His paintings are in the permanent collections of the Mystic Seaport Museum, the Lyman Allyn Art Museum, the Coast Guard Academy and the Submarine Memorial Museum in the New London area. His work is also in the permanent collections of the Mariners Museum in Newport News, Virginia, the Naval Academy Museum at Annapolis, Maryland and in the Charlestown Navy Yard Museum in the Boston National Historic Park. Levey's spirited seascapes and ship portraits are based in his long professional life at sea as a career naval officer. Beginning at age seventeen, he served in both surface ships and submarines, rising from apprentice seaman to the command of USS SABLEFISH, an attack submarine. After his retirement from the Navy, he continued to work closely with nuclear submarines and their crews to develop search and attack tactics. He was awarded the Navy Distinguished Public Service Award for leading the program to evaluate and develop new combat tactics for 688 class nuclear submarines. Born in Brooklyn, N.Y. Levey roamed the waterfront sketching and absorbing atmosphere. His paintings of the final years of the great New York port are particularly vivid and document the working merchant ships and harbor craft of the past 50 years. Many of Levey's paintings hang in the wardrooms of naval vessels and in the homes and offices of the seagoing community. He is a frequent exhibitor at the Maritime Gallery at Mystic Seaport where he was awarded the prestigious Rudolph Schaefer prize at the 1985 Mystic International Show and the Mystic Seaport Purchase Award from the 1991 International exhibit. He is an artist member and a past officer of the American Society of Marine Artists and has been designated as a Navy and Coast Guard artist.