Robert Mehling

Painting Visual Poetry

I was born Robert Raymond Mehling near New York City on October 10th, 1954, and currently live and paint on Long Island. Artistic ability emerged early, but I became a career painter only recently.

I create pictures by looking at things and painting their likeness. My images are rendered in the academic pictorial style of “classical realism” (an emerging, non-modernist, alternative modern art). This gives my painting a traditional look, but my version is a unique amalgam of influences, and my subjects are personally significant. Therefore, my work is current and relevant - not atavistic.

My goal is to capture the character of what I see. A painting can delve deeper than a snapshot's superficial facts without using distortion or invention to express an inner nature. I try to paint this essence without abandoning draftsmanship. I translate the images, with feeling and beauty, into painted objects of greater clarity and gravity than observed. This feat is made possible by concentrating on process. Describing what's in front of me plainly - with a genuine desire to share what I find - does the trick. When it comes to catching quintessence, neither mannerism nor machine-like precision beats honest painting.

Motif is as important to me as technical proficiency. I imbue my still lifes with a curious tone. Groups of objects are arrayed in deliberately complex ways, as if their combinations imply a hidden meaning, but I usually have no conscious statement. I select things of interest to spark mental associations and suggest chance narratives, but not to tell specific stories. My purpose is simply to share forms with the viewer that I find beautiful and interesting.

Pictures are primary. They don't have to be “about” anything; they communicate directly, without words. Because words try to explain pictures, they are (for me) ancillary to painting. Therefore, my paintings are best understood by viewing them. Look and wonder, “why did he paint that thing?”, “what does it mean?”, but don't answer yourself in words. Just think and feel.

For me, nothing is more rewarding than painting. To communicate reality’s non-verbal quintessence directly, to recover painting’s venerable pictorial vocabulary, to distill visual poetry from objective space; what more splendid study, what more noble occupation, what more “reason for being” could a being hope for?

GROUP EXHIBITIONS (RECENT):
2004
East End Arts Council. Jan. 9-Feb. 7.
2003
The Parrish Art Museum. Oct. 18 -Nov. 9.
Phoenix Gallery. Oct. 19 -Nov. 2.
Riverhead Incubator for the Arts. Aug. 3 - Dec. 31.
Salmagundi Club (Non-member Juried Exhibition) June 10 -29.
Grenning Gallery. May 17 -June 15.
Blue Door Gallery. Jan. 10 -Feb. 10, Aug. 23 - Nov. 10.
East End Arts Council. Jan 10-Feb. 1, Feb. 7-Mar. 8, May 23 -June 22, June 27-July 27, Aug. 1-Sept. 6. Winner’s Show: Oct. 17 - Nov. 15.
2002
Arts Council of the East Islip Public Library. Oct. 19 - 27.
Smithtown Township Arts Council. Oct. 18 - Nov. 24.
Riverhead Free Library. June 8-July 2, Nov. 20-Jan. 25 (2003).
Elaine Benson Gallery. May 9-28.
East End Arts Council. Jan.11-Feb. 16, Feb. 22 -Mar. 30, June 7- July 7.

SOLO EXHIBITIONS:
2004
Port Washington Public Library. “Salience and Shadow: The Still Lifes of Robert Mehling. June 2-29.
2002
Avram Gallery, Southampton College, Long Island University. “Posting Past Dues”. April 27-May 4.
1998
Riverhead Free Library. “Local Landscapes”. April 3 - May 29.

AWARDS AND GRANTS:
Jan. 2004 Second Place. East End Arts Council. Work honored: Mementos with Shrunken
Gourd. Oil. Juror: Arlene Bujese.
Nov. 2003 Special Opportunity Stipend. Grant from New York Foundation for the Arts.
June 2003 Certificate of Merit. The Salmagundi Club. Work honored: The Teacher. Oil.
Jurors: John Foote, Claudia Seymour, et al.
May 2003 Third Place. Southampton Artists Association. Work honored: Jug, Horn and Print Blocks. Oil. Juror: Liz Malunowicz.
May 2003 Third Place. East End Arts Council. Work honored: Blue Bulb. Oil. Juror: Laura
Grenning.
Oct. 2002 First Place. Arts Council of the East Islip Public Library. Work honored: The
Teacher. Oil. Jurors: Stephen Bozler, Stella Castro and Bill Girimonti.
June 2002 First Place. Riverhead Free Library. Work honored: Table Setting with Pitcher.
Oil. Jurors: Alan Bull and Liz Malunowicz.
June 2002 Honorable Mention. East End Arts Council. Work Honored: Shed Wall. Oil.
Jurors: Susan Carter, Karen Fellows and James Pritchard.
Feb. 2002 Best in Show. East End Arts Council. Work honored: Self Portrait with
Attitude. Pastel. Juror: Dan Gilhooley.
June 2001 Honorable Mention. East End Arts Council. Work honored: Winter Pilings.
Watercolor. Jurors: Alan Bull, Ellen Weiner and Margaret Garrett.
June 2000 Second Place. East End Arts Council. Work honored: The Double. Oil. Jurors:
Peter Whitney, Marjorie Gosnell, and Mary McKenna.
July 1999 Second Place. Brookhaven Arts & Humanities Council. Work honored: Land
Escape. Oil. Juror: Katherine Winn.
May 1997 Honorable Mention. Southampton Artists Association. Work honored: The
Crowded Pond. Oil. Juror: Elaine Benson.