Philip Koch Paintings

Charles Burchfield, conte nature study, Burchfield Penney Art Center, Buffalo, NY Earlier this month I was at the Burchfield Penney Art Center for my first visit as the Art Center's Artist In Residence. One of my goals with the Residency is to study the working process of Charles Burchfield, an artist I deeply admire, to nourish my own working methods with my paintings.  BPAC is a treasure house of Burchfield's drawings. Tullis Johnson, Curator and Manager of BPAC's Burchfield Archives, kindly pulled out for me volumes of Burchfield's drawings to examine. It was amazing to cradle his drawings in my hands (I did wear cotton gloves). Burchfield drew in widely contrasting styles. Most of the drawings I'm reproducing here are his tremendously impressive finished nature studies. Their delicacy and sureness of form made me think of Leonardo da Vinci.   But most of his drawings were gesture studies- drawings made rapidly more with his whole arm t...

Several months ago Scott Propeack, the Associate Director and Chief Curator of the Burchfield Penney Art Center in Buffalo, New York invited me to be the second Artist in Residence at the Art Center for the next year. I'm just returned from the first of what will be a half dozen visits to the museum between now and summer of 2016.  In my opinion, Charles Burchfield is one of the best painters of the 20th century. Burchfield has been one of the main influences on my own paintings of the natural world. I'm honored to be given this  opportunity by the Burchfield Penney Art Center.  As an artist I've a keen awareness that none of us is alone in our studios- rather through our work we're engaging in a conversation with key artists who have gone before us. Painting after all is a language. By studying those who spoke it exceptionally well, I know I can learn to tell my own story better. Burchfield's work is different in many ways from mine, yet I feel stro...

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...

Winslow Homer 1836-1910 Next month I've been asked to deliver a slide talk at the annual dinner of the Baltimore Watercolor Society. My title for the talk is a little tongue-in-cheek, but it's an acknowledgement that watercolor can be the trickiest of painting media. But my big point will be that seeing the work of some previous masters of this delicate medium teaches how to enjoy our eyes on a deeper more satisfying level.  Three of the most important American watercolorists are Winslow Homer, Edward Hopper and Charles Burchfield. Let's start with Winslow Homer, who is photographed above wearing a natty three-piece suit that I bet he never wore to paint in.  Homer's watercolor Stowing Sail, (1903, Art Institute of Chicago) was the first painting I ever saw. My parents had a framed print of it hanging over our sofa. I distinctly remember as a 3 year old connoisseur I used to lie on the carpet and study it. I figured it wasn't very good.  ...

Philip Koch, The Reach, oil on panel, 10 x 15, 2015 Sometimes things take a while to unfold.  I've always found I do well when I've let time pass and return to paintings weeks or months after I've made them to see how I can understand them differently. Often they seem to softly call me back and whisper in my ear about changes they think will make them more clear and focused. Usually when I listen to them things get better. Philip Koch, Edward Hopper's Parlor, Nyack,  oil  on panel, 12 x 9", 2015 I've been working happily in my studio the last few weeks on a focused project of revisiting some oils from last year and adjusting their colors. Lights and middle tones are getting some new emphasis. Philip Koch,  Sonnet I,   oil on panel, 6 1/2 x 13", 2015 Here are a few from the group I've been working on. Some of them will serve as the basis for some new large studio oils. Philip Koch, Frenchman's Bay, o...