DAVID ROHN
As I See It
May 27 – July 9, 2023
Opening and Artist Reception
Saturday, May 27, 5-7pm
Artist Talk
Saturday, June 17, 5pm
Watercolor and oil paintings by David Rohn
Still Life on Checked Tablecloth, 2023, oil
Throttle back, I say to myself. I work on, see what happens. The worst self deception is attractive humility…it is self betrayal. Once the instinct arrives that you have some penetrating insight into the nature of…things…everything…you cannot evade the obligation to push on.
I made a switch between being active and scheming to make a great painting, to being passive and just receiving the motif…Why should I have to invent anything when it’s just there? It was psychologically tranquilizing, and it still is to this day.
~David Rohn
“Supervising a puddle takes all of your attention.”
“I can look at nothing long enough until the mind makes it significant.”
“Art, done well, is a way of twanging the mind, and the mind is infinitely resonant.”
“I saw the music between the spaces—I just need to show up for what nature offers.”
Mitchell•Giddings Fine Arts is pleased to offer this rare look into David Rohn’s painting. His extraordinary gift of playful observation creates compositions of unexpected appreciation and analysis of the common object. This exhibition includes watercolor and oil paintings spanning from 1970 – 2023.
David Rohn’s ability to speak in a unique watercolor voice suggests there’s magic in his choice and command of materials and technique. The transparency of watercolor, with light reflecting back from the white paper through thin veils of color, is as pure as his freedom and liberation from an art world of expectation and judgment. This master of watercolor, using delicate washes and expansive passages of color, with humor and sensitivity, lets us observe and appreciate our own lives simply by presenting a shared beauty.
A David Rohn painting shifts our sensibilities to where ordinary becomes elegant. We move through space in a new way. That’s what art does, and Rohn leads us to that place. ~JIm Giddings & Petria Mitchell
The Art of David Rohn, a documentary of the artist, by Robert Fritz.