Philip Koch Paintings

Philip Koch,  Monhegan Dawn: Ochre , oil on panel  6 1/2 x 13", 2015 On Friday, March 6 I'm giving a gallery talk in Nyack, NY about the work in the Edward Hopper House Art Center 's current exhibition Philip Koch: Landscapes and Hopper Interiors . Naturally I've been mulling over what I want to say. The talk's at 7:00 and is free to the public.  The show is taking place in the house where Hopper was born and grew up. It's situated on a rise one block above the open sweep of the Hudson River, something that played a huge role in his youthful imagination. Years later he would build a studio for himself atop an 80' sand dune overlooking the waters of Cape Cod Bay in Truro, MA. And if one visits that studio that Hopper himself designed down to the last nail, one can't help but be struck by how similar it is in feeling to his Nyack home. That's no accident. Philip Koch, Sun in an Empty Room , vine charcoal, 9 x 12", 201...

Here's a selection of photos from the Edward Hopper House Art Center in Nyack, NY of their opening reception for their new feature exhibition Philip Koch: Landscapes and Hopper Interiors  that was held Saturday, Feb. 22.  Carole Perry, the Executive Artistic Director of the Art Center did a tremendous job hanging the show and sensitively lighting the works. Honestly I think this is one of my all time favorites of solo exhibitions I have had over the years. The work will be on display through April 12, 2015. Philip Koch in front of his oil The Voyage of Memory, with the oils  White Thicket  in the middle  Yellow Arcadia at the right . Deer Isle, oil on panel, 36 x 72" at right. Above the mantel: The Voyage of Memory, oil on canvas, 38 x 38" Some of the smaller works in the Hallway Gallery of the Art Center. Upper left:  Sun in an Empty Rood: Blue , oil on panel 12 x 16", to...

I am just back from Nyack, NY where I was on hand for the installation of the Edward Hopper House Art Center 's upcoming feature exhibition Philip Koch: Landscapes and Hopper Interiors. The show will officially open with a reception on Saturday, Feb. 14 from 5-7p.m. Please come and say hello! Here is a photo of the installation in progress in the Hopper House's main galleries. I am pressed for time now so I won't be writing a usual blog post, but I did want to show a quick selection of some of the works to be displayed. Here is the freshly shoveled front walk to Edward Hopper House Art Center- no doubt young Edward Hopper shoveled it clear more than a few times in his day. White Thicket, oil on linen, 28 x 42" Edward Hopper's Parlor, Nyack, oil on linen, 32 x 24", 2015 Deer Isle,  oil on panel, 36 x 72", 2008 Truro Studio Kitchen, pastel, 6 x 8", 2010 Edward Ho...

                               Alfred Bricher, Sea and Rocks Near Newport, Indiana University Art Museum I was wandering through images of paintings and stumbled across two old and dear friends- the two paintings by other artists that first inspired me to make copies in oil. Back in 1970 I entered the MFA Program in Painting at Indiana University with no idea what kind of art I wanted to make. My paintings often were going several different directions at once,  starting with straight observation, bouncing into expressionism and hitting a few surreal notes. But I had the good fortune to almost immediately fall in love with the large exhibition of 19th century landscape paintings the IU Art Museum had staged.  One of the artists in the show was Alfred Bricher (Am. 1837 - 1908). I was allowed to set up my paints and make a copy directly from his original painting above. Making copies w...

Carole Perry, the Executive Artistic Director of Edward Hopper House Art Center in Nyack, NY wrote the following essay for the exhibition catalogue for their upcoming show Philip Koch: Landscapes and Hopper Interiors . The exhibition runs Feb. 14 - April 12, 2015. There will be an opening reception Saturday, Feb. 14 from 5 - 7. All invited! As an art student in the late1960s, Philip Koch (b. 1948) found inspiration in the geometric and color field abstractions of artists such as Josef Albers, Frank Stella, and Mark Rothko.  Koch created abstract paintings until, he says, “[Edward] Hopper came along and tapped me on the shoulder.”  With the ghost of Hopper as his guide, Koch turned his attention to the landscape and began to paint from nature in a realist style. What he learned from Hopper, Koch says, “was to be relentless in pursuit of just the right idea to make a painting… Don't settle for anything less than extraordinary his work said to me."    ...

      Philip Koch, Yellow Arcadia, oil on panel, 30 x 40", 2006 I've changed.  Early on I painted the landscape by directly observing a specific place. With my paints and portable easel in tow, I'd head out seaching for sources that called out to me.  My paintings were reports on how an actual location looked and felt at a specific time.  I'm very proud of the work I did then.  In the last decade and a half I've come to see landscape painting as a means to evoke more a state of mind than a particular location. Memory and imagination loom larger as sources as I paint. My painting Yellow Arcadia is a good example. It's a favorite of mine and will be included in the upcoming exhibition Philip Koch: Landscapes and Hopper Interiors  at the Edward Hopper House Art Center in Nyack, NY Feb. 14 - April 12, 2015.  In our imagination the word Arcadia has come to represent an idyllic and unspoiled wilderness. Alternately it's seen as a p...

Went to an exhibition of paintings by a prominent realist painter who is known as one of the first committed photorealists, painters who consciously attempted to capture the look and feel of a color photograph in their work. The work had been executed with extreme care and was impressive for the amount of detail each canvas catalogued.  But if pressed, I would admit my most favorite works would be from other painters from the museum's permanent collection. The art I like best is about feeling and mood. They are highly interpretive.  And they're always surprising, you don't know ahead of time what the artist is going to focus on and what they're going to leave out. Charles Burchfield,  The Mysterious Bird,  watercolor, Delaware Art Museum Edward Hopper and Charles Burchfield are two of my favorite artists, as long time readers of this blog know.  Neither of them used photographs as sources for their work, preferring instead the dictates of their own...