TENAYA SIMS has worked professionally as an industry artist, teacher, gallery artist, and business owner. Tenaya began working in the video games industry at Crystal Dynamics (Eidos) while in high school. After graduating from Carnegie Mellon University, he continued working in this field at Treyarch (Activision). After feeling compelled to produce physical artwork, and to reach an equivalent level of mastery as the the historical painters that inspired him, Tenaya left the video games industry to apprentice full-time with artists Jeff Watts and Juliette Aristides for a duration of 5 years. Tenaya began his teaching career working with incarcerated youth while apprenticing with artist Juliette Aristides. While this job was originally intended to finance his own studies, Tenaya found through working with these youth, that he had a passion for teaching. After completing his studies, Tenaya began teaching adults at a variety of venues. When a dedicated student base formed, he founded his own academy called Georgetown Atelier. Tenaya owned and ran Georgetown Atelier for 7 years as an independent organization, until merging with Gage Academy of Art in August 2016. Over the past 8 years, Tenaya has exhibited his work at a variety of galleries and venues, primarily in the NorthWest. In 2016, Tenaya won Best in Show for the 12th International ARC Salon Competition.