Painting / Mixed Media

Contact Information

716 N. Third Street
Philadelphia, PA 19123
e-mail:
Please contact artist for purchases, commissions, etc.

Artist Statement

My recent work is a continuing encounter with ideas, constructs, memory and time and the materials I work with.

Time spent in the studio and mitigating factor of accident help push my mental notes, napkin diagrams, and visual memory into the real world of tactile surfaces and physical objects.

the fall is one of a group of encaustic and “constructed” paintings made between 2006 – 2008. The paintings rely on the property of wax to layer meaning as well as compound the effects of light, coloring, and translucency. My immediate subject was pattern making and symmetry, computer generated composition, implied motion and the incidence of accident . The paintings, quite naturally, take on their own direction allowing the subtlies and richness of the surface to accrue.

Motion and emotion had been a concern of mine when I developed installation pieces in the late 1980′s that drew cohehsion from a surreal mix of slowly rotating objects, recorded music, projection and the occasional gas lamp.

the fall takes its seed from a photograph of a late Gothic painting depicting The Descent and the position of Christ’s head to his angular torso. I constructed a painting of elements – sky, outline of head, gothic portal, canvas cutouts in a diagrammatic way. What I hoped to achieve was both silvery air and geometric play while retaining the original fascination with the subject.

My formal training is sculpture and design: painting on canvas is a relatively new endeavour though I am never far from the simple forms and inverted objects and meanings that always delight me.

Artist Bio

Robert Solomon has furniture designs licensed to EuroPine, LTD, NJ. Has had numerous group shows and one person shows from 1975 til the present; works in private and corporate collections; articles in several publications and is a participating member DaVinci Gallery. More of his recent encaustic works can be seen at myartspace.com.

Education

University of California, Los Angeles, CA
Graduate program, Architecture

Tyler School of Art, Elkins Park, PA
Graduate program, Sculpture

Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA
BA, Art and Design

Affiliations

2009 – present
Member, SAGE projects, Philadelphia, PA

1989 – 1991
Member, Furniture of the 20th Century, New York, NY

1976 – 1980
Original member, Nexus Foundation for Today’s Art, Philadelphia, PA

Selected Exhibitions

2009
the (dark) show, StrataSphere Gallery, Philadelphia, PA

New Talent, Rosenfeld Gallery, Philadelphia, PA

COLOREVOLUTION: A Matter of Light, SAGE Projects, Philadelphia, PA

Purpose/Repurpose, SAGE Projects, Philadelphia, PA

Contemporary Voices: 69th Juried Exhibition, Woodmere Art Museum, Philadelphia, PA

2008
Art of the State: Pennsylvania 2008, The State Museum of Pennsylvania, Harrisburg, PA

Absolute Abstract 2008, Sketch Club, Philadelphia, PA

1986
Made in Philadelphia, Institute of Contemporary Art,
Philadelphia, PA

Exhibitions Curated

2009
Co-curator, Personal Boundaries, SAGE projects, Philadelphia, PA