Bio/Press/Statement

ROBERT COANE
- BIOGRAPHY -
"et every man exercise the art he knows."
~ Aristophanes

BIOGRAPHY

Painter and draftsman best known for provocative political works. He's exhibited at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts and the Tweed Museum in Duluth, MN; Vanderbilt University in Nashville, TN; and at El Museo del Barrio, Wright Gallery and L’Acajou in New York City. Over 30 years teaching nationally and abroad, including the Minnesota Museum of American Art School and the New York Academy of Art. Most recently he was featured artist in "Focus on the Figure" at Hopper House in Nyack NY and his solo, "The Color Flesh", was presented at The Arts Center in St. Petersburg FL.

He has held residencies at El Museo del Barrio and at the Universidad Internacional Menéndez y Pelayo in Santander, Spain. For twelve years taught Drawing, Color Theory and Pastels at the Parsons School of Design. He is currently Director of L’Atelier in NYC, which he founded in 1983, conducts Master Workshops in Figure Painting and Drawing and is webmaster to www.Atelier-RC.com. He has been featured on Naked New York and The New York Press.

An accomplished draftsman since early childhood, he was apprenticed to artist Fran Cervoni at the age of twelve. In New York he studied drawing under Gary Faigin and painting under Francis Cunningham at the Art Students League, anatomy at the New York Academy of Figurative Art, and perspective and design at the Parsons School of Design.

PRESS

"...a modern-day Michelangelo...that good!
[His] art is superb! No more, no less. One can feel that artistic competence gushing from [his] mind and hand."
- James Leonard-Amodeo, Director/Editor
THE FINE ARTS MAGAZINE

"...a painter of integrity." - JAMES CAMPBELL

"... body fragments -- a head, a torso -- that intellectualize the body without dehumanizing it. His gorgeous oils painted on wood panels do more for skin tone than an Estee Lauder makeover and have a visceral, baroque richnes."
- Lennie Bennett, ST. PETERSBURG TIMES

"Without any narrative to distract the viewer, like a prizefighter, his work goes for the jugular… He keeps his cool and uses his painting skills to let his depictions of the human figure speak for themselves, clear and precisely defined territory whereby thematic limitation is a liberation. Akin to the likes of francis Bacon or Lucian Freud with strong influences from Caravaggio. …a monumental quality…a sense of drama…"
- Emil Memon, NY ARTS MAGAZINE

"Ferociously political"
- ART STUDENTS LEAGUE OF N.Y. NEWS

"His painterly political cartoons...reveal a muralist's lexicon of ingenious symbolism and a satirist's acid edge"
- Holly Bridges Elliot, ARTS MAGAZINE

"The clarity of presentation, demonstrated through his painterly, artistic technique, lends integrity to the message and challenges the viewer to reckon with its meaning"
- LEHMAN COLLEGE ART GALLERY REVIEW

"Although not everyone may agree with Coane's political views, the clarity of his presentation, demonstrated through his painterly, artistic technique, lends integrity to the message and challenges the viewer to reckon with its meaning."
- Nellie Escalante, PALANTE CATALOGUE, LEHMAN COLLEGE

"The most provocative paintings...Coane's powerful, unambiguous pictures are designed to evoke a visceral response and do so very effectively"
- Mary Abbe, MINNEAPOLIS STAR TRIBUNE

"Sentimental irony abounds"
- Vivien Raynor, NEW YORK TIMES

STATEMENT OF INTENT

"I always try to paint like other people and I always end up painting like myself."- Willem de Kooning

Recent work is about form, color and surface detail. Technically Dutch panel painting, it is firmly rooted in European painting tradition with an eye to modern sensibilities in color and composition.

Fragmented figures or objects are rendered against flat, bold, striking backgrounds and often paired to create startling overall abstract forms.

The lighting is Caravaggio; the high-keyed tropical palette, Gauguin. Dramatic cropping makes for a unique tension between negative shape and image.

Suggestive or narrative titles have been eliminated in favor of a simple nomenclature used for identification purposes only. The frames have been designed and hand crafted by the artist for emphasis. The gesture remains spontaneous, the color brilliant. Luminous, compressed, stark, unencumbered, unadorned, the image speaks for itself.

Portrait of the Artist with Donors

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