Philip Koch Paintings

Here's a tour of my second solo show at New York's George Billis Galler y that is on display until Jan, 19, 2013. I want to say something about each piece in the show, so probably I'll do this in three parts. You can enlarge any image by clicking on it. Let's start with the images above. This is Inland, oil on canvas, 44 x 55", the largest piece in the exhibition. For many years I've loved painting the forest interior in New England and the Adirondack Mountains. Often beaver ponds have caught my imagination, like this one. These furry little engineers clear out some of the trees, giving a landscape painter a shot at painting a deeper space like this one. This is  Ascension,  oil on panel, 40 x 32".  Ascension  is a large oil painted entirely from my memory and imagination. As the title suggests it conveys a feeling of rising up as its central focus. For many years I had been...

Philip Koch, Banner,  oil on panel, 24 x 18", 2011 The Carbon County Cultural Project (CCCP)  in Jim Thorpe Pennsylvania will be opening a new solo show: Philip Koch: Contemporary Landscapes  at the beginning of July.  Above is one of the new oils I'll be including. The CCCP beautifully illuminated what my painting is about in their press release for the exhibit by pairing a short quote from a prominent writer and poet with something I'd written myself. I was quite moved by their juxtaposition. Here's that part of the release: "Our children no longer learn to read from the great Book of Nature from their own direct experience or how to interact creatively with the seasonal transformations of our planet. They seldom learn where their water comes from or where it goes. We no longer coordinate our human celebration with the great liturgy of the heavens."   -Wendell Berry "As a kid I sensed right away that Nature was something of i...