Bill
Rohan
Residents of small towns in the Connecticut River Valley
will recognize at once the diners, downtown shops, and tree-lined
streets depicted in Bill Rohan's art. But his work will strike
chords with viewers across America through their warm portrayals
of small cities and towns, places like Florence, Northampton,
and Springfield. Like a cooler Norman Rockwell for the postmodern
era, Rohan paints in a realist idiom softened by an appreciation
of the simple, pleasurable sights of everyday life.
At first glance Rohan's work resembles the precise, objective
paintings of the photorealist movement of the 1970s. His perceptual
rigor allows him to include objects like cars, lightposts,
fire hydrants, and signs that other painters might omit for
the sake of composition. But this attention to the most commonplace
objects--and Rohan's use of warm, soft yellows and oranges
to depict the circles of light cast by streetlamps, for example--reveal
his fascination with the minutia of the world around him,
about objects for their own sake. More than "realistic,"
his eye captures iconic American images like Miss Flo's Diner
or the Academy of Music in their best light.
If Rohan's eye often smoothes out the cityscape he paints,
it sometimes has the opposite effect on his portrayal of diners,
one of his most frequent subjects. Works like "Blue Diner"
and "Bluebonnet" feature a cooler pallet of blues
and grays, which undercut the traditional nostalgia trip given
to most contemporary treatments of diners. Even the warm night
images of "Fillin' Station" and "Night Diner"
stress authenticity, relying on the interest of the subject
matter to carry the picture, rather than resorting to easy
gimmicks to gain the viewer's appreciation.
for more information about this artist, contact Hart
Gallery
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