Trent Gudmundsen was born 1978 in California and grew up in a small Utah farming community where he began oil painting at the age of fourteen. He later attended college on a full-tuition art scholarship, but frequently found himself painting in the nearby fields and canyons instead of attending his classes. He left school to forge his own artistic path and soon thereafter met and married Lorajean. They settled in Cache Valley on the Utah-Idaho border and, that same year, Southwest Art magazine recognized Trent's potential in their annual "21 Under 31" issue. In August of 2010, the magazine would highlight Trent again in a six-page feature article.

Trent's work has been recognized with top awards on a national level including at the American Impressionist Society National Exhibition in New York 2019, Oil Painters of America National Exhibitions 2003 and 2009, and the National Oil & Acrylic Painters Society's Best of America Exhibit 2019.

Inspired largely by European and Soviet impressionists and realists, Gudmundsen's paintings of people, animals and landscapes are traditional in theme, but painted to lean into a very contemporary approach. Trent often simplifies parts of the painting with graphic blocks of color and subdues and deconstructs backgrounds or subjects until they become almost dreamlike in quality. He seeks in his work to be ever more accurate while also tantalizing the viewer with interesting edges and brushwork.

Trent and Lorajean and their six children live in Idaho in a farmhouse that Trent built with his own hands. His art studio is attached to the back of the house, with a door that's always open.

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