When Robert Moore attended ArtCenter College of Design in Pasadena, California, he already had a degree in art education with a teaching certificate, but he still had the simple work ethic of an Idaho farm boy. “It was awkward,” he recalls. “It really was culture shock.”
Autumn Ensemble, oil, 36 x 48”At ArtCenter, however, he took classes “seven terms straight” with Dan McCaw. “He focused on design and harmonies, taught me about freedom in my work, as well as control. He also taught me about color, values, edges and surface.” McCaw has said, “For an artist it’s essential to be curious. It’s one of the main things—to be curious, to be open-minded, to be vulnerable.”
Backlit, oil, 20 x 24”
Moore was vulnerable. He had broken his left wrist playing basketball and when the wrist was in a cast, taught himself to write and paint with his right hand. Healed, he found he was ambidextrous and now paints with implements in both hands as if he is conducting a symphony. He is also colorblind, seeing all colors in shades of yellow and blue. Since he can’t replicate the colors of nature, he has developed an impressionist style of harmonies within value ranges and a simplification of masses.
Rocky Mountain Poppies, oil, 30 x 24”In Autumn Ensemble, the horizontals of foreground middle ground, background and sky are crossed by the verticals of aspen trees, all in thick paint applied with brushes, palette knives and fingers—a “realistic” mountain scene. In Backlit, there is a strong contrast between background and foreground. The dark, silhouetted tree forms stand out from the background and “gave me more room to play,” he says. “It didn’t matter what hues I applied since the viewer will read dark against light in the design. Combining similar values and intensities you get beautiful relationships.”
Always reveling in the variety of creation, Moore says he wants “to share the peace and joy and freedom I experience through my art. I hope others will sense the peace and joy of searching out those treasures. I’m thankful that the Lord has allowed me to spend my life seeking and gleaning wisdom from His creation.
Midday Splendor, oil, 48 x 72”“I hope it strikes a chord in the viewer’s heart," he continues. "That it will raise the question, ‘Why does this work? What’s the treasure here that the artist has figured out and transposed onto a canvas?’”
He sees the unity in diversity. “You see that in all creation, the thumbprint of the God of the bible—in the Trinity—three persons, one God.”
Moore’s latest paintings will be shown an InSight Gallery in Fredericksburg, Texas, November 4 through 25. —
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