American Art Collector - April 2013

Roland Petersen: A Journey Through Time

Roland Petersen "Interior Figure With Still Life"  1997  |  Gouache On Paper  |  22 X 29.25

With an art career spanning more than five decades, Roland Petersen has honed his craft into a distinctive style that melds vivid colors, abstract patterns and an extensive understanding of light and shadow. Twenty paintings from throughout Petersen’s career will be on display at Elliott Fouts Gallery in a solo exhibition, April 6 to May 2.

Petersen began his career as an abstract artist. After receiving his master’s degree in 1950 from the University of California at Berkeley, he studied with Hans Hofmann for a year. Petersen then dabbled in printmaking in Paris and was an art history teacher in Pullman, Washington. His studies and jobs led him on a path from abstraction to realism. In 1956 he was hired as a professor at the University of California, Davis, where he taught for more than 35 years. During this time he was introduced to the region’s figurative artists who worked with big, blocky forms. This infused a more expressionistic style into Petersen’s paintings, leading to the work he has created since the 1960s.

Roland Petersen  "Picnic Day" 2011  |  Acrylic on canvas  |  24 X 48

Picnics have been a common subject in Petersen’s artwork. Born in Denmark, his family moved to San Francisco when he was a child. “My parents were members of a Danish club...and annually they would have Danish picnic parties,” recalls the artist. “One of my earliest picnic scenes was titled Danish Picnic.”

Color also plays a large role in Petersen’s paintings. He pieces together sequences of varying shades to create logical, bright compositions.

“In putting my paintings together I start first with a monotone layout...to work out the general dark and light pattern, and gradually add colors to that. I set up a kind of sequence of colors that I keep repeating and making variations of,” explains Petersen.

Roland Petersen  "The Hot Tub" 1999  |  Acrylic on paper  |  25.25 X 29.25

He reworks the colors throughout the painting, forming as many different combinations as he can while still keeping the theme logically in a particular order.

“I hope that the compositions and various combinations would be intriguing to each collector,” says Petersen. “...if one sits down and examines the construction of the paintings—apart from subject matter— I would hope they could figure out what the colors were doing and think of it more as a game of how the color is put down and how inventive I’ve become doing so.”

- American Art Collector, April 2013

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