- Terry Rodgers
Infobox Artist
name = Terry Rodgers
imagesize =
caption =
birthname =
birthdate = Birth date and age|1947|9|11|df=y
location = Newark,New Jersey
deathdate =
deathplace =
nationality = American
field =Painting
training =Amherst College
movement =Figurative Art
works =
patrons =
awards =
footnote1 =Terry Rodgers (born
September 11 1947 ) is an American figurative painter known for his large scale canvases that focus on portraying contemporary body politics. He was born inNewark, New Jersey and raised inWashington, D.C. , He graduatedcum laude fromAmherst College in Massachusetts in 1969, with a major in Fine Arts. His strong interest in film and photography influenced his style in the direction of representational realism in art.In 2005, three of his monumental figurative canvases were presented at the Valencia Biennial. Abroad he has had solo exhibitions in galleries in
Amsterdam ,Zurich andMilan , and participated in group shows around the world. In the United States, he has had solo gallery exhibitions in New York,Los Angeles ,Atlanta , andChicago .He has also exhibited at numerous museums in the US including the
Museum of Contemporary Art Jacksonville , theErie Art Museum and theMobile Museum of Art . Abroad, his work has been exhibited at the Stedelijk Museum - 's-Hertogenbosch, theKunsthalle der Hypo-Kulturstiftung in Munich, the Museum Franz Gertsch in Burgdorf, theMuseum Folkwang in Essen, the Gemeentemuseum Helmond, the Scheringa Museum of Realist Art in Spanbroek and at the Kunsthal Rotterdam.Life
Rodgers began drawing as a young child. He seriously began experimenting with color when his mother gave him her set of old paints.
As a precocious artist, he was seducing unsuspecting friends to model for him in increasingly compromising attire. Imagine his delight, when at drawing classes at the
Corcoran School of Art , he had the good fortune to be confronted with an enormous, loosely fat, woman considerably his elder.“There were these exquisite layers of flesh. Rolls of it. It wasn’t about learning how to draw, or sex or social crap. It was about opening my eyes.”
About the same time as Rodgers' eyes were falling out of his head, his photographer grandfather gave him a huge camera and took him to their native
Norway . Hundreds of pictures later it was clear: drawing and photography were it for him.By the time Rodgers arrived at
Amherst College in Massachusetts, he was drawing regularly. Each night he joined several other students to draw from a model, training his hand to automatically respond to what his eyes told him. A few lines would render the essence of a gesture, and what came to matter was a sense of authenticity rather than perfect likeness.When Rodgers exited college in 1969, the contemporary art scene, dominated by the American School of Abstraction, was fast becoming the playground of the emerging
Pop Art movement. Though this meant the return of some kind of figuration, and he was quick to take in the insights these movements offered, Rodgers continued to search for another non-abstract way to express himself, one that included a greater awareness of our physicality. He moved to a commune with some musicians, filmmakers, and other creatives, positioning himself outside the prevailing culture. Here he painted with independence.When the boom of the 80’s and 90’s came, Rodgers hit the streets again, looking for faces…faces to render a transformed America — transformed by money, coke, glamour and celebrity with the media defining it all the way. Here was a wildly affluent America. “I see a world driven by desire and crushed by pseudo satisfaction…wanting better bodies, more beautiful faces, expensive clothes, stunning architecture, exclusivity. “
He took on the challenge of sketching a fresco of contemporary America. “My hope is that these paintings reveal fragile, genuine human beings trying to figure it out.” [Zimmerman, Jim. (from interviews for) "Vectors of Desire:Terry Rodgers' Vision of the American Millennial Moment".iUniverse/Standing Watch Productions. 2004.]
Critical Response
...Terry Rodgers is a realist known for his contemporary character studies. While his earlier paintings often contemplated personal and family relationships in brightly lit outdoor settings wrought with pale, intense, high-keyed colors, his recent paintings conjure up a vision of the private nightlife of America’s privileged youth. Widely exhibited in the U.S. and Europe and noted for their subtle social commentary ...Rodgers’s complex compositions emphasize the detachment of his characters: the eye can trace the angles and curves of their intersecting bodies on the painting’s surface, but their gazes almost all diverge from each other. They seem to share the disappointment of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s hollow glamour seekers and the bourgeois ennui mined by
Eric Fischl andDavid Salle ... [Byrd, Cathy. "Terry Rodgers at Fay Gold." Art in America. No. 2. February 2006 (review/reproduction).]Cutting edge art ... and the figurative is again avant-garde in the paintings by Terry Rodgers... The viewer is at the same time a voyeur and a guest at the party, but an existential calm reigns in the paintings. Rodgers is a master of composition. His strange parties are, despite all their photographic qualities, put together like a painting by Rubens. [Rump, Gerhard Charles. "Terry Rodgers: Einsam sind die Schonen und Reichen Dieser Welt. " Die Welt(Germany). December 18, 2004 (review/reproduction). (English translation from German.) http://www.welt.de/print-welt/article359209/Terry_Rodgers_Einsam_sind_die_Schoenen_und_Reichen_dieser_Welt.html]
...There is also a troubled insouciance in his characters despite the appearance of living out a seeming fantasy – the clothes, the looks and lounging in the midst of a quasi-orgy fest – there is something fragile and complex about his characters... [Cochran, Paul. "The Bold and the Beautiful," Aishti Magazine (Lebanon). December 2006/January 2007 (feature/reproductions).]
Notes and References
Further reading
*George Kinghorn, "Skin: Contemporary Views of the Body", Museum of Contemporary Art Jacksonville, 2003. ISBN 0-9740580-0-9
*Julia Haussmann, "zuruck zur figur, malerei der gegenwart (back to the figure, painting of the present)", Prestel Verlag Kunstahalle der Hypo-Kulturstiftung and die Autoren, 2006-2007. ISBN 3-7913-6079-5
*Alina Reyes & Catherine Somzé, "—The Apotheosis of Pleasure—Terry Rodgers", TORCH Books, 2006. ISBN 978-90-73920-23-1 | ISBN 90-73920-23-X
*Howard Tullman & Paul William Richelson, Ph.D., "Creative Imaginings: The Howard A. and Judith Tullman Collection", The Mobile Museum of Art, 2006. ISBN 1-893174-09-3
*Luigi Settembrini, "3rd Bienal de Valencia: Agua sin ti no soy (Water without you I'm not)", 2005. ISBN 84-482-4134-7 | ISBN 88-8158-570-7
*Jim Zimmerman, "Vectors of Desire: Terry Rodgers' Vision of the American Millennial Moment", iUniverse/Standing Watch Productions, 2004. ISBN 0-595-32884-9External links
* [http://www.terryrodgers.com Official Terry Rodgers Website]
* [http://www.nicolavonsenger.com/e_portal_rodgers.htm Terry Rodgers at Galerie Nicola von Senger]
* [http://www.artnet.com/Galleries/Artists_detail.asp?G=&gid=1055&which=&aid=14412&ViewArtistBy=online&rta=http://www.artnet.com Terry Rodgers at TORCH Gallery]
* [http://www.cameralittera.org/?page_id=131 "Camera Littera on The Apotheosis of Pleasure" by Camera Littera]
* [http://www.terryrodgers.com/news/magazines/articles/absent_full_e.htm "The Absent" by Alina Reyes]
* [http://www.iconique.com/flash/arts-feat50.html Iconique.com Les Arts Digitales feature]
* [http://art.webesteem.pl/12/rodgers_en.php Webesteem Art & Design Magazine feature]
* [http://www.blend.nl/weblog/archives/2006/12/de_vaas_als_gra.html Blend Magazine video documentary of Terry Rodgers]
* [http://www.welt.de/print-welt/article359209/Terry_Rodgers_Einsam_sind_die_Schoenen_und_Reichen_dieser_Welt.html Die Welt review]
* [http://www.chiefmag.com/issues/8/profiles/Terry-Rodgers/ Chief Magazine interview]
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.