Philip Koch Paintings

Philip Koch, Rooms by the Sea III, oil on panel,  8 2/3 x 13", 2014 Last week I sent three of my oils up to Addison Art Gallery in Orleans, MA on Cape Cod. They will be shown as part of the Gallery's two year long After Hopper  project in conjunction with the Cape Cod Museum of Art in Dennis, MA.  Edward Hopper (with Jo Hopper in the background) sitting in front of the Truro studio in a photo by Arnold Newman In 1983 I began a long series of residencies in Edward Hopper's studio. He chose to build it high on the ridge of a sand dune overlooking Cape Cod Bay in S. Truro. The artist had scouted out the location in 1930 during his first extended stay on Cape Cod. He even lovingly painted the site that would later be home to his studio in his 1930 oil Hills, South Truro  pictured below (now in the Cleveland Museum of Art). It suited the reclusive Hopper perfectly as back then the Cape was a far lonelier place.  My painting Rooms by the S...

Charles Burchfield drawing out of doors in the winter near Buffalo, NY (All these images are courtesy the Burchfield Penney Art Center,  Buffalo, NY). Last week I was the featured speaker at the Baltimore Watercolor Society's Annual Dinner. We had a great audience of 80 some people. I showed watercolors by Winslow Homer, Edward Hopper (OK, no surprise there) and Charles Burchfield.  I saved Burchfield for last as I suspected he was the least well known of the three.  Several people approached me after the talk to say they'd never seen Burchfield's work before and wanted to know where to go to see more. (I recommend the Burchfield Penney Art Center's website which is where I obtained these images). Deserted Miner's Home, 1918 Burchfield Penney Art Center In his spooky Deserted Miner's Home  the house and barn seem to almost scream out at us through gaping mouths. Yet nearly nightmarish drama is counter posed to an almost monochrome r...

One of the three American watercolorists I'm going to be talking about this coming week when I give a talk to the Baltimore Watercolor Society is Edward Hopper. The example of his works was my greatest teacher when I was a young artist. There he is above giving the camera his typically gruff demeanor. Behind him looms the studio in Truro, MA on Cape Cod that he and his wife Jo lived in for half of each year for some thirty years. Below is a watercolor he made of Jo as she sat drawing on a chest in front of the studio's 10' tall north-facing window seen in the photo above. (During one of my 15 residencies in Hopper's studio I discovered the same chest now resides in the studio's basement). While not a complete painting his watercolor shows Hopper's characteristic love of clearly defined spaces with solid forms bathed under a strong light.  Here's yours truly sitting in front of the same window last fall. The individua...